Because of You
by Sandshrew777
Summary: A series of oneshots. Each chapter is inspired by one lyric of Because of You, by Kelly Clarkson. Spans all generations, quite a few pairings, and a good number of characters.
1. Spare the Rod, Spoil the Child

**Author's Note: This piece is a collection of one-shots. Although one or two chapters may be synergistic, they each stand alone as a work of their own. Each chapter is influenced and inspired by a line of Kelly Clarkson's "Because of You"; therefore, in a way, this is a kind of songfic. Please enjoy.**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but my own imagination. The characters depicted here all belong to J.K. Rowling except for those that I have fabricated for the story's purpose. The song lyric belongs to Kelly Clarkson and company.**

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_I will not make the same mistakes that you did_

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"Oh, for Merlin's sake, Algie, will you leave the poor lad alone?"

The comment comes airborne from boisterous Cousin Gerri in the parlor and I sigh in frustration. Algie's been trying to get that boy to show signs of magicality for years, and every time I catch him at it I always tell him that if he's going to be magical, God'll give us a sign without his interference. Age is a thief in the night, though, and Algie is prone to leaving the key to his memory unlocked, because not more than fifteen minutes later Algie's off pulling another of his wild stunts to torture poor Neville.

In any case, Neville's someone special to have survived all of Algie's little experiments and live to tell---well, as much as he can, the little tyke---the tale, especially considering what he's been through so far in his short life. It's been three years since the accident. I consider it a miracle that Neville made it past that relatively unscathed; then again, it's also a miracle that Neville had the sense to stay away from Cousin Meretta's potato salad today. Honestly, that woman swears by the culinary wonders of pickle juice and horseradish, and she puts them into nearly every dish she makes. More power to her, I say, if she can digest that without running to the loo every twelve seconds.

The kettle whistles, and I take it off the stove, preparing the tea tray. For as long as I can remember, these weekly Sunday get-togethers have always taken place. Call it a family tradition. No matter what's going on, no matter what Dark Lords are menacing into our lives, no matter what squabbling took place last week, we always come together at the eldest family member's home to spend the day---after church services, of course.

Since Mum passed three years, six months, two weeks, and twelve days ago (may the Lord bless her in heaven), the responsibility of hosting the get-together has fallen to me. I don't mind. Cooking is one of the things I enjoy, even if it takes a while since I don't use magic to do it, especially now with Neville in the house. It's never a good idea to leave a wand lying around when you've got little ones, Mum always said, and I've taken it to heart. Of course, I still use it when I need it for other things, but when I'm cooking I always leave it in my top apron pocket, just out of little Neville's reach.

"...and then the Jarvey says, 'I'm a stinker? Have you smelled your shoe lately, Emeric?'"

The room explodes into laughter as I walk in with the tea service, tutting.

"Honestly, Jarvis, you shouldn't tell those kind of jokes, especially on a Sunday. What would Mum say?" I scold him, taking my usual seat in the overstuffed Gryffindor red armchair near the fire, tea and saucer in hand.

"She wouldn't say nothin'. She'd just give him a good whack!" Jarvis' wife, Teri, exclaims, and bops Jarvis with one of the throw pillows on the sofa for good measure.

The room dissolves into laughter again. The din increases as the clinking of glasses, saucers, cups, and other china fills the air as the family gathers their tea. I sit and watch, serenely sipping my tea and listening to the fire crackle behind me. Their words batter my ears, but I do not listen nor hear them, and, upon noticing my faraway look, nobody engages me in conversation. I appreciate them all for it. Sometimes it's pleasant to just sit back and reflect on things when everything else around you is in chaos.

My eyes alight on little Neville, who is sitting on my brother Fran's lap. Fran is a sweet man. Never married, and I never understood why. I never asked, either. There are some boundaries that even siblings do not dare to cross.

Neville laughs as Fran tickles him. My heart is stabbed with the memory of dear, sweet, loving Alice. Frank would tickle him like Fran does now on so many of those Sundays, and Neville would gurgle and later laugh that now haunting melody that we always remarked sounded so eerily like Alice herself.

They loved him, yes, that was for sure, and in the end that's what did them in. When they were attacked, they spent their time trying to get Neville to safety instead of reinforcing their wards. If they had only noticed that their Anti-Apparition ward had been disabled...

I break myself from the thought. It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live. Albus always says that. It's one of the few things I think he's gotten right all along, the barmy old coot. He's a brilliant man, but he's got a few screws loose. No matter; we all still love him.

"Can I have some, Gran?"

Neville stares up at me with Frank's eyes. I take a moment to regain my senses and realize what he's asking for---tea---before I respond.

"No, you may not," I answer, stressing the 'may', "And remember to say 'please' when you ask for something," I remind him, patting him on the head as he nods and goes over to Cousin Gerald, who sweeps him up and asks how his sunflowers are doing.

It pains me to be so curt to the child, but it worked with my own children and it's going to work with Neville. Spare the rod and spoil the child, the saying goes, and I do not intend to do that. Frank and Alice did once and it cost them their lives. No matter how well-intentioned it was, I will not repeat their mistake.

Besides, if I did, it'd leave poor Neville at the mercy of Algie, and no child deserves that.


	2. Heartbreak Hotel

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but my own imagination. The characters depicted here all belong to J.K. Rowling except for those that I have fabricated for the story's purpose. The song lyric belongs to Kelly Clarkson and company.**

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_But I will not let myself cause my heart so much misery_

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"I'm over him, I'm over him, I'm over him..." she repeats to herself. A mantra of futility, really. She'll never be over him. Nobody gets over their first crush.

"I'm over him, I'm over him, I'm over him," she continues, vaporizing his letters, his notes, and anything else she can correlate to him with a swish and some Latin. She stops when she accidentally Transfigures the now-empty box of fancy liqueur chocolates that he'd gotten her for Valentine's Day into a big, hot pink marshmallow. Crumpling to the floor of her dormitory, she lets out a few good sobs.

"Oh, for bollocks' sake, who am I kidding? I'm not over him, I'll never be over him," she admits, and seventeen snotty tissues later she's back on her feet, ready to head to the library and do some research for that essay Flitwick assigned on Confuddlement Charms. She checks her face in the mirror, performs some subtle magic to fix her face so that not even the most astute of her peers would know that she has been crying, and fetches her books from atop her desk.

She cannot let her heart's pain be known, she reminds herself. In this house, a revealed secret is like blood in the water. Moments after it is released, the sharks come to feed, and once they latch onto you they will never let go again.

Unless, of course, you're dead.

"You going to the library, Millie?" her roommate asks her from one of the leather couches.

"Room's all yours," Millicent Bulstrode replies, and strides out of the Slytherin common room, determined to focus on what sections she'd need to look in when she got to the library and not the almost overwhelming desire to give into emotion, like a Gryffindor. Like the Gryffindor whom she thought had---dare she say it, think it, even, in the deep recesses of her mind and of her heart?---deemed her someone special, someone worthy of attention, someone worthy of loving and being loved.

Every voice that echoes in the hallway as she hurries to the sanctuary of the peaceful library sounds like him. Her heart leaps into her throat and her step falters until she sees that the face is not his. Every time it happens she berates herself, and each time she gets a little better at hiding it from the passerby, until by the time she's three staircases from the library she has it completely under control.

Maybe tomorrow, she rationalizes as she steps into the welcome silence of the library, maybe tomorrow she will succeed in Transfiguring her heart into stone. Today, however, it is a big, hot pink marshmallow that's getting dangerously close to the flame.


	3. Roller Coaster

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but my own imagination. The characters depicted here all belong to J.K. Rowling except for those that I have fabricated for the story's purpose. The song lyric belongs to Kelly Clarkson and company.**

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_I will not break away; you did, you fell so hard_

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The Quaffle comes barreling towards her and she nimbly snatches it out of the air, speeding forward, dodging Fred as he attempts to strip it from her. Just before George gets within range, she executes a perfect backhand toss to the waiting Angelina, who neatly catches it and spurs onward towards the waiting Oliver in the goal. The Beaters have the practice off in Oliver's demented noggin; each practice, one of the four divisions of the team wouldn't be practicing anything related to their responsibility to the team. Instead, they would aid the others in various drills that Oliver put them through, and today it was the Chasers who were being put through their paces.

She finishes her route after the throw to Angelina, continuing forward and forcing George to move, and move fast, thereby nullifying any chance of him intercepting Angelina as she goes in to try and score. George does move, but not the way she expects; instead of swerving to the left or right, he pulls up. Hard.

Alicia screams as George accidentally rams into her. She takes the hit, unfazed; her scream was of surprise, not of pain or fear.

George's, however, was.

In the collision he somehow lost his grip on his broomstick handle. For one terrifying moment, George hangs from his broomstick by only his feet, but then gravity takes over and he comes crashing down to earth.

Too stunned to react, Katie sees two blurs whiz past her; Harry and Oliver have shot after George in a feeble attempt to save him. Harry's Nimbus Two Thousand isn't quick enough to overcome the huge distance deficit between him and George; Oliver's Cleansweep doesn't have enough power to get him there in time. George hits the ground with a sickening crunch, the broom landing, intact, shortly thereafter.

Finally, Katie finds her bearings and swoops downward. She is the last to touch down but the first to feel responsible. Rushing over to him, she yanks her wand out of her robe pocket and kneels down opposite Fred. Angelina and Alicia respectfully but concernedly keep their distance. Oliver hovers around, ever the mother hen. Harry, having never been present to witness a serious injury before to one of his teammates, seems to realize that yes, this too is a part of Quidditch, and stands with the two Chasers as the information settles into his brain.

Katie takes all this in in a matter of moments as she tends to her patient. Of the seven, she's the best at healing spells, and they all---except Harry---know that. Working her magic, she performs several diagnostic charms and x-ray peeks into George's body, looking for serious wounds. All she can find, to her relief, is a slightly fractured kneecap and some bruised ribs, which she slowly but artfully and correctly mends.

George's eyes flutter open as she finishes and everyone, predictably, swarms him.

"What, you never see a wizard this strikingly handsome before?" he jokes, even more predictably, as Fred hauls his brother to his feet. They hug briefly before Oliver squashes them both in a bear hug of his own. Alicia and Angelina are quick to join in, and a confused Harry follows them after a second's hesitation. Katie does not, however, lost in her thoughts.

"I thought you were going to break your route," George explains, coming over to her as the team gets ready to take to the skies again.

"I thought you were going to swerve, you big dolt!" Katie fires back, suddenly as jaunty as she ever was, lightly punching him in the arm. He rubs his shoulder, feigning hurt, then grins as he takes flight again.

Katie watches him for a moment, her smile evaporating as quickly as it came, replaced by a bit lip and downcast eyes, then slowly rises into the air as well, more determined than ever before to make sure she knew where every single one of her teammates were at any given moment.


	4. Sid the Janitor

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but my own imagination. The characters depicted here all belong to J.K. Rowling except for those that I have fabricated for the story's purpose. The song lyric belongs to Kelly Clarkson and company.**

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_I've learned the hard way to never let it get that far_

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I haven't been kissed in years. The last time I was kissed was by my mother, when I was five and going off to primary school. I was so scared, but Mum kissed me and told me everything was going to be okay, and like the little fool that I was, I believed her, and my first day of primary school was delightful.

Of course, she was wrong when she said that everything was going to be okay, because she couldn't always ensure that I wouldn't get my nose into trouble---which I did---or that bad things wouldn't happen. She certainly couldn't stop Sid the Janitor.

I was nine at the time. Mrs. Kletenbaum, the substitute for our usual teacher, Mr. Thiem, let me go to the loo without the hall pass (a block of wood with the words 'Hall Pass' painted on it in bright blue lettering). Proud of my achievement, I strutted down the hallway, hoping all the students in the classrooms that I passed would see me, bravely walking in the hall without the proper precautionary measures. Unfortunately for my nine-year-old self, Sid the Janitor was the only one who took notice.

As I waltzed into the bathroom, feeling very smart indeed, and headed towards the urinals, Sid the Janitor hung a 'Closed for Maintenance' sign on the door of the boys' bathroom. When I finished relieving myself, I zipped up, turned around, and there he was, looking at me. Slightly unnerved, I moved quickly to the sink. As I went to push the button for the soap, he moved closer. I hastily turned the knob and rubbed my hands together as he slowly closed in on me. I stuck them underneath the faucet, not caring that the water was ice-cold, and washed the soap off as fast as I could. Finished, I turned it off and reached for the paper towel dispenser, but Sid caught my hands.

"Such lovely fingers you have, Ernie," he said, the smell of sardines pervading my nose as he exhaled in ecstasy. His grip was tight, controlling, and although I squirmed to get out of it, my fingers remained trapped in his. Slowly, deliberately, he brought his face down to my hands, kissing each of my ten fingers.

"Oh, yes, so lovely...and so sweet," he added. I finally succeeded in wrenching my fingers away---I suspect, now, that he let me---and ran for the door, only to slip and fall on the wet floor. Now in a panic, I scrambled up against the wall, unable to regain my footing as Sid leered over me.

"This won't hurt a bit," he lied.

Ten minutes later, Sid was gone and I was back on my feet again. I scrubbed for what seemed like an eternity at the sink to get his saliva off my hands. When I thought that I had succeeded, I wiped my hands on my blue jeans to dry them and walked back to class, hoping that this time nobody in the classrooms would see how dirty I was.

"Welcome back, Mr. Macmillan," Mrs. Kletenbaum aloofly greeted me---she was pushing ninety and rather senile---as I returned to class, taking my seat. I resolved to do two things that afternoon: one, to never, ever ask to go to the loo again in class; and two, to never, ever let anybody kiss me ever again. Not on the lips, not on the cheek, and certainly not...where Sid did.

"I said, Ernie, will you go to Hogsmeade with me this weekend?" the voice of Sally-Anne Perks invades my memories.

I make up some excuse that she naively believes and she leaves to rejoin her friends. There's nothing wrong with Sally-Anne, absolutely nothing at all. In fact, she's rather fit, if I do say so myself.

I guess the old line works here: "It's not you, it's me." I can't let anybody get any closer than an arm's length away from me. If I do, I'm afraid that when they lean in to kiss me, their face will suddenly be replaced with Sid's, and I'll feel his spit on my hands and the smell of sardines on their breath and suddenly I'll be nine years old again and dirty and used and helpless and I can't let that happen, not now, not ever again.

I just can't.


	5. Street Smarts

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but my own imagination. The characters depicted here all belong to J.K. Rowling except for those that I have fabricated for the story's purpose. The song lyric belongs to Kelly Clarkson and company.**

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_Because of you, I never stray too far from the sidewalk_

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Some days, they don't see me. They're caught up in their own world, or maybe they're persecuting someone else, but all that matters is that that time, they didn't see me.

But when they do, they do, and there's no getting away. I'm not very fast, and even though they're pretty big, I can't outrun them. I tried, before, but after tripping over my own feet in my haste and encountering dead ends time after time, I just surrender to them, now, and let them do with me what they will. I cling to the false hope that maybe, if capturing me is no longer a challenge and I don't respond to their beatings, they will get bored with me and finally just leave me be.

It's been eight months, and that still hasn't come true.

When they catch me, they go one of two ways. One is to drag me into an alleyway, hold me down, and beat me with whatever's handy: fists, my schoolbooks, snapped branches. The other is when they hold my arms behind my back, tear off my shirt, and burn me with their fags. They know right where to put them, too: anywhere that's not in plain view. I haven't been able to feel anything but pain out of my thighs and forearms since they started it.

The words they level at me go in one ear and out the other. It all happens so fast that my brain doesn't have time to register them; besides, it's being overloaded with all the pain sensors going crazy in my body.

When they leave, they give me one last kick or shove against the wall of some building, and I lie there, amongst the dirt. It's a good idea, I tell myself, to make its acquaintance now, so that when I come to live with it soon I won't be a stranger; after all, Mum always says that soliciting salesmen are the rudest people alive.

Eventually, though, I stumble out of the alleyway and go home. I'm a latch-key, so I have time to clean myself up before my parents get home. They always ask me at the dinner table how my day has went, and every night I make up some fanciful tales about how wonderful school was and how I was the only one in the class to figure out the challenge problem on the maths test. It makes them so happy. Who am I to spoil that for them?

This morning, I leave the house and shoulder my backpack, keeping a linear path on the sidewalk and making sure not to raise my eyes to look at anyone. When I reach the crosswalks, I look for immediate impending traffic and then cross as quickly as I can. I always keep to the sidewalk. I never take shortcuts through the alleys, because I fear that they might be in one of them, just waiting to pounce on me and rough me up before my day can even properly begin.

Three blocks away from school I manage to duck into a convenience store when I see them round the corner. I don't know why I'm in here; usually I just let them come at me and get it over with, but today my feet moved of their own accord and so here I am, browsing the small aisles of this hole in the wall, picking up a package of mini donuts and walking up to the counter. I pay for it swiftly, tucking the treat into my jacket pocket, and steel myself as I exit the store, ready to be accosted by them at any second.

Instead, however, they are gone. I don't know where they are, and to be honest, I really don't care. These last three blocks go by far faster than usual, and as I approach the school, I cross to the stairs, abandoning the sidewalk and walking instead on the dewy grass. As I enter the doors and make for my locker, I cannot help but feel safe here. There are cameras and teachers watching at every moment; Dudley Dursley and his goons cannot hurt me here.

The bell rings for homeroom and I scuttle into the room quickly, my jacket and backpack now safely secured in my locker.

"Evans, Mark," the teacher dryly calls out and I raise my hand, intent on finishing the last of my algebra homework.

For eight more hours, I am safe. They pass far too quickly, but then again, they always do. My backpack seems heavier than usual, I note, as I exit the doors of my sanctuary and return to the cold, cruel world that awaits me. My feet find the stone support of the sidewalk again, and I trudge onward to my doom.


	6. Risky Manuever

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but my own imagination. The characters depicted here all belong to J.K. Rowling except for those that I have fabricated for the story's purpose. The song lyric belongs to Kelly Clarkson and company.**

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_Because of you, I learn to play on the safe side so I don't get hurt_

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"Knight to D5," Ron says, and I cringe. As usual, Ron's spotted the only move that would ruin all of my well-laid plans. Now I have to switch gears and think defensively, but it's pretty useless. Once Ron's on the attack, he's nigh unstoppable. Only Ginny can successfully go into defensive mode and survive Ron's assault with enough pieces to launch a meaningful counterattack of her own. Of course, by then Ron's usually got her almost right where he wants her, but she still lasts the longest of any of us.

"Pawn to E7," I decide, and Ron leans back in thought. I'm not sure why we keep playing him when he always thrashes our sorry arses. Maybe it's because we like to see Ron in his element, which is so rare for him. Funny bloke and all, but not much upstairs when it comes to classes. Thank Merlin Hermione's around to bail him out when he's mangled an Astronomy essay or can't figure out how he's screwing up a charm he's trying to learn. Thank Merlin Hermione's around for all of us. A godsend, that girl is.

"Queen to C3," Ron counters. I'm in deep now. Harry gives me a smile of sympathy as he finally recognizes Ron's plan. I'm surprised Harry, who's usually rubbish at thinking ahead in chess, has figured it out. Guess he's not the Boy-Who-Lived for nothing.

"Castle to A8. Check," I desperately attempt. Ron'll surely see through this last-ditch effort, but it'll stall him for a couple turns, and maybe he'll goof up. Of course, the chances of that happening are about as good as Seamus waking up before noon on a Saturday. That boy sleeps for so long that sometimes I swear he's nocturnal.

"King to B4," Ron replies quickly. He knows what he's doing. I have no choice but to put the end of this game in motion.

"Bishop to C4," I announce, and Ron grins as his pawn is obliterated. I've stepped into the red zone and he has me in three short turns---"Queen to C4, Queen to F7, check, Queen to E6, checkmate."

"Good game, Dean," Ron praises, but I know he's lying through his teeth. I shake his proferred hand.

"Good job, Ron, as always," I respond, "I'm gonna head up to the Owlery. Anybody got a letter they need sent out?" I ask. Harry and Ron shake their heads. Neville says he does, and alights to the stairs. I remind him to not worry about Seamus---a freight train wouldn't wake the kid up. Neville and Ron give me confused looks, but Harry laughs.

"It's a Muggle thing," he assures them as he takes my seat and prepares to be trounced by the King.

I lounge in one of the comfortable plush armchairs as Neville gets his letter. My own, to my family, is in the inside left pocket of my robes. I send them a letter every Saturday so that they know what's going on here at school, and I usually get a reply by Wednesday of the following week. We're a close-knit bunch, us Thomases. I almost didn't come to Hogwarts my first year because I was afraid of being away from them for so long.

Harry gives a sigh of frustration; Ron's already got him in a clinch. He'll manage to get out of it, but he won't be in too good of shape to fight back too much. I know why, too; Harry takes too many chances when he's playing chess. He throws pieces into the fray without too much concern for the future and aggressively plays through a linear plan until the plan is no longer feasible. With Ron, aggression will just get you beat faster, though. Six years and Harry still hasn't gotten it yet.

It's why I always try to play conservatively when I play. I build up a halfways decent defensive system, get my pieces in the spots where I want them, and then surreptitiously try and make my move. It always fails with Ron, who spots what I'm doing after thinking long and hard regarding one of my odder moves, but for the most part it seems to work well. Simple, methodical, and effective, that's me in a nutshell.

"Thanks, Dean," Neville says, reappearing and handing me a slightly bruised letter to his Gran.

I wave it off and head for the portrait hole. Ron gives a shout of surprise as I start to clamber in, so I turn around and head back to the game. Apparently, Harry's done something Ron wasn't expecting and Ron's queen pays the price for his folly. I grin; sometimes even the smartest of us forget the simplest of solutions. Of course, Harry won't last too much longer, but the fact that he managed to surprise Ron gives me hope for the guy.

"What's with the bloody shouting?" Seamus grumbles as he appears at the foot of the stairs. It's ten-thirty, and I'm shocked to see him conscious, if not awake. Guess today's full of surprises, I think to myself as I finally drag myself away from the game---Harry's going to lose in six moves---and out the portrait hole. One thing's for sure: at Hogwarts, there's always a surprise around every corner. Only one thing can be counted on, and that's that nothing can be counted on to work the same way every time. I guess I've forgotten that.

I've also forgotten about the trick step on the second staircase outside of Gryffindor Tower, it seems. A simple bit of Latin---after a check that nobody was around to catch me doing magic in the corridors---frees me, but I can't help but feel a little stupid. I dumbly, safely skipped the second stair, knowing that the trick step is there on even-numbered days of the week, but forgot the second trick step that shows up in place of the seventh step between nine in the morning and nine in the evening on Wednesdays and Saturdays.

Five minutes and much grumbling later, I've reached the Owlery. I coo to two of the school owls who ruffle their feathers a bit until they finally indulge me with their obedience. I neatly tie my letter to the first, a handsome screech owl, who is awing just as soon as I finish the tie-job. As I reach for more string on the sill, I accidentally knock the spool over the edge. It tumbles downward and I just barely have the sense to shout a quick Summoning Charm before it hits somebody down below. It comes zooming back into my outstretched hand, and I take a few deep breaths, regaining my composure enough to tie Neville's letter to the very patient eagle owl.

As it flies away into the spring air, I look out over the grounds from the spectacular view of the Owlery. Nobody really spends too much time up here, because of the stench, but I don't mind it too much. Harry's socks combined with Neville's morning body odor kick the smell of owl droppings all over the field and back.

It's really a fantastic view, though. From here, I can even see a certain platinum blond and his two buffoons on the move in the courtyard. A devilish grin crosses my face as I look at my wand, still out and just screaming to be used. I could be spotted, true, but I think by the time Malfoy makes his way up here, I'll be telling the story to my mates in Gryffindor Tower.

Yeah, screw being safe, I say to myself as I take careful aim and fire an Itching Spell at Goyle, a Jelly-Legs Jinx at Crabbe, and a Bat-Bogey Hex---I learn well the hexes used on me by my old flames---at Malfoy. I stand there just long enough to know that my spells have found their target, then rush out the door and back to the Gryffindor common room.


	7. Dear Diary

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but my own imagination. The characters depicted here all belong to J.K. Rowling except for those that I have fabricated for the story's purpose. The song lyric belongs to Kelly Clarkson and company.**

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_Because of you, I find it hard to trust not only me but everyone around me_

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Dear Diary,

I can't believe that she did it. What's more, I can't believe that I was so stupid about it! I didn't see the signs, and I wish I did. I hope Harry's okay...

I know why she did it, now. She told me. Well, not in so many words, but us Ravenclaws are supposed to be able to get subtle stuff when other people don't!

She came to me about three weeks ago. I was downstairs, in the common room.

"Cho," she said, "What would you do if Flitwick asked you to come to his office for special lessons every Wednesday?"

"Creeped," I responded, not looking up from my Potions text, "I love old Flitwick, but not like that."

"I'm serious, Cho. What would you do?" she insisted, sitting down in one of the hardbacked wooden chairs.

"Well," I started, looking up---but not at her---and donning a thoughful expression, "I'm pretty sure I'd take the lessons. Flitwick was a champion dueler, after all."

"But what if they were the same time as Ancient Runes?" she pressed, giving me that intent look that I'm sure she inherited from a velociraptor somewhere along the evolutionary line.

"Hmm. I think...I think I'd still take the lessons," I replied. She had a valid point; I loved Ancient Runes more than any of my other classes---mainly because I was the best in our year at it---but to pass up the chance to learn from Flitwick himself? That was folly.

"You would?" she asked, her voice shooting up nearly an octave. She's not a soprano in the school choir for nothing.

"Yeah," I said, somewhat aggravated now that I'd lost my train of thought on my work-in-progress Potions essay for the third time thanks to her, "Any other hypothetical situations you want to bug me with, Marietta? I'm sorry, sweetheart, but I'm really busy right now. Snape, you know," I apologized. She nodded, biting her lip as she rose and headed upstairs to the dorms.

I can't believe that I missed it entirely. Usually when people come to you with hypothetical situations, they're talking about themselves! It's the simplest observation in the book, and I was too focused on bloody Snape to figure it out!!

I'm more angry at myself than I am at Marietta. Her family's rooted in the Ministry; what else was she to do? I'm surprised she went on this long, really.

But, still...she betrayed us! Betray is not a word I use lightly, but she did it, and while I may understand her situation I'm certainly not going to forgive her anytime soon. She was one of my absolute best friends in the world; we've grown up together in this House, and she goes and does something like this. Something unforgivable. Something abominable. Something that makes me wonder if I'll ever be able to share my secrets with anyone else like I did with her all those late nights when we were young, staying up with Honeydukes chocolate and whispering our crushes, our fears, our lives into each other's ears...

I think it's best now for me to go to bed. I'll find Harry in the morning, if Umbridge didn't get him. I've got to explain to him why Marietta did it; I can't have him thinking that I'm anything like her, that I would do anything that would hurt him like that.

Thank you, diary, for listening. I know I can always trust you.


	8. The Night Shift

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but my own imagination. The characters depicted here all belong to J.K. Rowling except for those that I have fabricated for the story's purpose. The song lyric belongs to Kelly Clarkson and company.**

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_Because of you, I am afraid_

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I hiss and I growl. A human has stepped into my path. My back arches. I continue to hiss and spit. Move, human, I command. You have frightened me. Beware my wrath.

The human looks at me. I stare back. I mewl angrily. He---it is a male, I sense as I sniff---is afraid as well. The smell of it dampens the air. I advance, hissing, sensing the weakness. He whimpers and runs. I am pleased.

I have defended my territory. I do so against all comers. The humans scare me when I first see them. Sometimes I do not hear them. My senses are beguiled by age. It is no matter. They all run when faced with my might.

I am, as my Master calls me, Mrs. Norris, and this floor is mine. Trespass at your own risk.


	9. Mexican Jumping Bean

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but my own imagination. The characters depicted here all belong to J.K. Rowling except for those that I have fabricated for the story's purpose. The song lyric belongs to Kelly Clarkson and company.**

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_I lose my way, and it's not too long before you point it out_

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I know it's kinda weird but it's only my second year at Hogwarts and I'm getting lost more often that I ever did last year. Maybe it's because I know my way around the more common spots so I can actually try and explore the whole thing, y'know?

I love to explore. Dennis and me always used to do that back home on the farm. Every day there was something new and exciting going on. Sometimes a cow would be giving birth to her calves and Dad would come and get me and tell me to come down and I would go get Dennis and we'd all go down together. Dennis always helped Dad with the cow, and I'd always watch and take pictures. I love photography. It's so awesome to capture a moment for all eternity in 'em.

What was I talking 'bout? Oh yeah, the cows! We've never lost a single animal in childbirth at the Creevey farm. I think that was what tipped off Professor McGonagall to Dennis and my's magic. It's kinda crazy to not have any animals die in twelve years when they're giving birth.

Death is a natural thing on the farm. Guess it's a natural thing everywhere, really, but what I mean is that we're used to death. We've gotta send pigs and cows and stuff to the slaugherhouse so we can make money off 'em and so other people (well, and us, too) can eat. I always feel bad for 'em, but that's what they're here for, I reckon.

Speakin' of knowing what things are in certain places for, I have no idea why I'm in the middle of nowhere. Well, not the middle of nowhere; I'm in Hogwarts, I know that much. I reckon it's been about twenty minutes since I've seen anything that I recognized and fifteen minutes since I last saw any other lifeforms in this place.

Right now I'm in front of this really cool tapestry that I've taken maybe five pictures of so far. It's hard to get the whole thing in the frame so in the end I had to split it up. It's one of those ones depicting the Goblin Wars that Binns always blathers on about in class. Y'know, you'd think goblins alone would be kinda cool, and the fact that they're warring would make it even cooler, but that guy---ghost---whatever---could talk the yellow off the hay, he's so boring. Oh, well. We all love our three-day-a-week nap periods.

It always gets me nice and refreshed for Defense class with Professor Lupin. He is so the coolest! His classes are totally wicked. Last week we were studying Hinkypunks and he actually brought one in to show us. He said he was working on them with the Third Years and thought we could use a few lessons on magical creatures, too. Of course, it was all theory that day; we didn't actually do any practical stuff until the next time, where we learned the Point Me spell in case we ever got really lost thanks to the Hinkypunks.

Oh.

Well, paint me purple and put me in the cornfield to scare away the crows!

"_Point me_," I whisper, and my wand shows me where north is, after some twitching. It's not too much help, really, but if I can make it to the North Tower then I can navigate to the Owlery and then from there I know my way back to Gryffindor Tower. Sometimes I really lose the plot, honestly...


	10. In Memoriam

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but my own imagination. The characters depicted here all belong to J.K. Rowling except for those that I have fabricated for the story's purpose. The song lyric belongs to Kelly Clarkson and company.**

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_I cannot cry because I know that's weakness in your eyes_

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Another friend is dead. The news just reached me today. The war is on, and casualities mount on both sides; the fact that Genella has died should not surprise me. She chose to be an Auror.

She was the best in our class at Defense. Always rocked out on the essays, always knew the right spell to cast and when to cast it to beat you in a duel, always knew where to move and what creatures and objects to avoid and seemingly everything, not unlike Ron's Hermione.

But where Hermione has stage fright, she had courage to the point of recklessness. Whenever people were arguing, she'd wade into the fray and try and play the peacemaker; guess that's why I'm so good at healing spells. Whenever a professor asked a question, she would raise her hand when nobody else would and take a shot at the answer. She was a Gryffindor, that was for sure, and seemingly unafraid of everything.

All that got her, though, were twenty-three years of wonderful life contrasted with her gruesome demise at the hands of the Death Eaters. They tell me that she was tortured for information, used by the men, and made to watch her squadmates that were captured each die their slow, painful deaths, one by one; she was their squad leader, so she received the honor. Then, when she refused to yield to the Imperius, she was beaten to within an inch of her life and left to bleed to death.

What good are spies, I think to myself, if they---like the ones who bring this news---can't prevent these kind of things; they're just too weak to fight evil one on one. Naive Ravenclaws who think they can win on intellect alone until their brilliant minds fail and all of a sudden they've said the wrong thing and they're gutted before they can cover up their mistake. Trusting Hufflepuffs who do what they're told even though they know they're not right for the job go in and never return. Foolish Gryffindors charge headlong into the challenge, find themselves in over their heads, and when they try to mount a heroic grandstand from within the enemy's defense, they're killed by some cheap Slytherin trick.

I let the typical Weasley fury embrace me fully as I throw myself into my work. Dragons require more maintenance then one would think: food, habitat control, temper control, binding spells (to keep them away from the surely tasty Muggles), dung cleanup and collection...the list goes on, and I've done them all. Today I'm on food preparation, which is relatively simple---take the rare game out of the freezer, heat it in the furnaces, then Banish it to the dragonyards.

Of course, I have to be outside to Banish the food to the dragons, and that's why I'm letting my anger control me. I can't show any weakness to these creatures; they're amazingly intelligent but quite callous. If they sense anything other than a worthy adversary, they'll be trouble for weeks to come. I learned that the hard way.

I lock the memories of Genella away in my heart until my work is completed. When I return to my tent, she will be there, and we will console each other until sleep overcomes me at last.


	11. Strings' Mercy

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but my own imagination. The characters depicted here all belong to J.K. Rowling except for those that I have fabricated for the story's purpose. The song lyric belongs to Kelly Clarkson and company.**

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_I'm forced to fake a smile, a laugh, every day of my life_

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The atmosphere at the Ministry is tense. No more are the memos floating around our heads looked upon with a tedious compassion, a sort of appreciation for the frivolity. Only the fatigue remains as we look upon them.

We walk hurriedly from space to space, eyes ever cautiously roaming about, like a tiger stalking its prey. It is as if we believe that Death Eaters lurk behind every pillar, around every corner, within every slightly moving curtain. None of us know when evil will strike next. The palpable fear is understandable.

All of us huddle in our offices, as I am today, working on various pedantic incidents our supervisors give to us to process, replicate, and prevent, as the case may be.

One would think that the Department of Mysteries would be devoid of this fruitless paperwork that, in the end, means little; a simple _Incendio_ gone wrong can shred a whole stack of them in mere seconds. One would be wrong.

I always liked making those little jokes based on words. Guess it's because I could give Uric the Oddball a run for his money. Ostracism because of my looks led me to my room, where I would hide behind the drapes and read my nights away, when my other dormmates were chatting, then fraternizing, then partying as the years passed without much incident.

It's a bit cliché, but I was the kid in the back of every room who never said anything, never drew attention to himself, always worked alone in the library, sat alone at meals, et cetera. Maybe that's what's made me so weak.

Of course, I don't feel weak anymore. I don't feel weak unless I'm told to feel weak. I don't feel unless I'm told to feel. I move when I'm told to move, I smile when I'm ordered to smile, I laugh when I am commanded to laugh.

My Defense books had it all wrong; the happy, careless feeling fades after a few months under the Curse. The strength of the Curse does wane if it is not renewed---which is why I am coherent enough now to be thinking these things although I'm not sure if I'm even thinking at all or if I'm saying them out loud---but this measly mental diatribe is all I can muster in resistance to it.

Perhaps if someone in the world had bothered to care to look in my direction when role was called and share a sympathetic smile when the professor stumbled over it, I might have a reason to fight back, but I do not.

My Foe-Glass on the wall next to the door suddenly reveals a face, ever-sharpening. As the lock on my office door meets the end of gentle wandfire and the doorknob begins to slowly turn, I see the face and know my thoughts will now be corralled for at least two weeks.

"Good morning, Augustus," Lucius says, shuts the doors, casts his usual wards, then points his wand at me and says the lone word to tighten the shackles further over my mind:

"_Imperio._"


	12. Tainted Blood

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but my own imagination. The characters depicted here all belong to J.K. Rowling except for those that I have fabricated for the story's purpose. The song lyric belongs to Kelly Clarkson and company.**

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_My heart can't possibly break when it wasn't even whole to start with_

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"I'm sorry, Michael. It just wasn't meant to be," she says. Biting her lip, she pats his arm rather lamely, looks down, then back up at him, and then grabs her books and walks out of the library, her gait a little swifter than usual, head held high and cheeks lightly flushing.

He sits there, staring, watching her leave. Slowly, his head droops lower and lower until he's nose-to-nose with his Charms textbook that he had been studying with her. His eyes alight on the words, but he cannot make them out; the letters blur together in a jumble until he cannot even see that they are letters anymore, much less words themselves.

Shutting the book with a sudden, sharp movement, he slumps back in his chair, crosses his arms, and sulks.

"How did that just happen?" he asks himself, internally. Speaking aloud in the library was verboten enough, but without anyone else around Madam Pince would have no other choice but to chuck him out (she was actually quite lenient when students were talking to one another, recognizing that her library was a safe haven of literary and gossipped knowledge), or, better yet, send him to Madam Pomfrey to get his head examined (of course, that would just be her excuse, just what she would say to him, although her creased forehead and worried expression in her eyes would reveal otherwise).

Ever the logical Ravenclaw, Michael makes a list in his mind, compiling from his extensive memory his behavior over the past few weeks in order to find the triggering behavior that stimulated this reaction out of Ginny.

Was it his continued teasing regarding the Gryffindor Quidditch team's "dirty tactics" beating Ravenclaw? He was just teasing, pretending to be all offended and affronted whenever the subject was mentioned. Maybe Ginny hadn't gotten that.

Was it his begging off time with her, claiming that he wanted to study? She should've known that he'd be as concerned as any Ravenclaw with his classs, so much so that he would even attempt to refuse his admittedly rather boisterous hormones.

Was it his reluctance to be open with her, to confess to her what he was thinking when she asked for it, to explain to her why he sometimes just needed to be alone, away from her and everyone else?

Was it Jennifer?

Jennifer was a playmate of his he'd found in the Muggle village the Corners lived near, Georgesby, when he was four. She and he would play in the sandbox, building magnificent castles with fancy turrets and windows where all sorts of amazing adventures would take place. He was the valiant knight, coming to rescue her, the trapped princess, from the evil sand monsters that guarded the castle, preventing her escape. Those were good times.

One day, at the playground, they decided to be courageous and try the monkey bars. Usually the older kids frequented them, but Michael, upon seeing that none of the older kids were around, figured that they should give it a try. Jennifer was uneasy at first, but after seeing the nimble Michael fly through them, she knew she had to try. Two bars in, her hand slipped and she went crashing to the ground. It wasn't a long drop, but to a frightened four-year-old, it was like going over Niagara Falls in a barrel.

Jennifer wailed and writhed in agony. The bone in her leg was sticking out at an odd angle, the playground mulch slowly being drenched in her red, red blood. Michael ran to her, panicky, not knowing what to do, watching her blood come out faster and faster and thinking that it would never ever stop no matter what he did and when he realized that he had to go get a grown-up Jennifer's screams suddenly stopped cold but he couldn't think about her wouldn't think about her just ran and ran and ripped open the door to the laundromat and screamed for help and the grown-ups came running and he led them to her running as fast as he could.

The ambulance arrived in time to save her, pumping several life-giving pints of blood into her body. They were bemused as to how she could have lost so much blood from such a relatively simple injury, but a few hours later they mysteriously forgot all about the odd circumstances, believing that Jennifer had simply fallen off of her bicycle.

As the grown-ups tended to her, and, later, the paramedics, Michael sat crying silently in the sandbox, looking sadly at the remnants of the last castle that they had built together.

Michael knows now why Ginny left him:

Self-preservation.


	13. The Road Less Traveled

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but my own imagination. The characters depicted here all belong to J.K. Rowling except for those that I have fabricated for the story's purpose. The song lyric belongs to Kelly Clarkson and company.**

**A/N: This chapter is AU (Alternate Universe).**

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_Because of you_

_I never stray too far from the sidewalk_

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He laughs to himself, but not aloud---laughing aloud would be like the characters laughing wild in Christopher Durang's play of the same name, and he knows how neurotic those two characters are. The source of his laughter is right in front of him. At a forty-five degree angle to his left and maybe six feet away sits one of his dormmates, furiously typing away at his computer. At the same angle to his right sits the other dormmate, typing on his computer as well.

What's makes it funny is that he is on his laptop, too, listening to music and working on a paper for biology class. Amazing how, only five or ten years ago, this would be an unusual occurence, he thinks to himself, marveling at how far technology has come.

Dormmate number one squints at the monitor. He has a paper stuck to it, somewhat askew. He glances at the other---he has two monitors for just the one computer; he one (dormmate number one) explained why, before, but he two (Oliver) wasn't really listening at the time, it could have even been he three (dormmate number two) who did the explaining---every now and then, apparently checking what he's typing. Kinda odd, really, Oliver notes mentally, but then again this guy has been weird ever since day one.

See, dormmate number one takes anti-depressants, keeps a journal on a typewriter, and plays records whenever possible. A bit awkward, to say the least, which Oliver never does.

Dormmate number two shuffles a deck of cards aimlessly. Five minutes later, he strips off his coat, revealing some rugby player's jersey---he (he three, mind) obsesses over rugby---and grabs some textbook from his reclining chair near the center of the room, recently adorned with a fancy white fleece-y sort of rug-thing.

"It's pimpin'," dormmate number two had to say on the subject when probed by a rubgy mate of his. Oliver preferred 'gaudy', but it's all a matter of taste, he acquiesces (and some don't have any, he adds).

Oliver also prefers football to dormmate number two's sport of choice, but then again, all the lads in the hall watched and kept up with football when it was in season, even freakster dormmate number one. Maybe it's the hair, Oliver jokes; the guy wears it in some sort of pompadour that went out of fashion years ago, in a vain attempt to be counterculture.

Twenty or thirty years earlier, Oliver knows, counterculture meant blazing one's brains out, which both dormmates numbers one and two both indulge in at least once a week. It astonishes Oliver, who never partakes; how they can afford the money to buy the stuff goes beyond his ken.

Of course, Oliver can't really afford to be anything much less than perfect. His family, already stretched to fit five kids, three dogs, and two cats, managed to muster up the funds to send him here to this prominent boarding school so that he could become the first member of the entire extended family to attend university. Oliver scoffs at the thought for a moment; it sounds more like the American dream than a Scottish one.

Nevertheless, one toe out of line and the dream will end, sending Oliver crashing down into the reality of his family's poverty. They're not that bad off, really, but as the cost of living goes up and wages remain ever constant, if not decreasing...well, it doesn't take a genius to figure out the problems that result, Oliver sarcastically points out.

Sighing like the stiff winter wind outside the bay window of the dorm room, Oliver resumes the typing of his paper. Three sentences in, dormmate number two gets up, grabs his wallet, and exits---off to a party, Oliver assumes, rolling his eyes as the door slams shut.

If only, Oliver catches himself wondering, if only it would be so easy to go out and party nearly every night, to wash all of one's troubles away with those magical alcoholic brews and potent herbs, instead of sitting here and ekeing out a paper on the structure and functions of the cell's parts.

Furious typing from Oliver's keyboard fills the room as he rips into his essay with abandon, channeling his disgust with his too-safe life into something positive. He can't afford to woolgather, can't allow himself the luxury of procrastination, not if he's got this long road of education ahead of him wherein lies a degree and a perfect job and the admiration of his family and that one girl out of the throng of potential dates and girlfriends that he finds to be the real deal, the genuine thing, the Keeper.


	14. Nimbus 100 Degrees

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but my own imagination. The characters depicted here all belong to J.K. Rowling except for those that I have fabricated for the story's purpose. The song lyric belongs to Kelly Clarkson and company.**

**A/N: I'm still here, and still going. NaNoWriMo hurts my brain. Enjoy.**

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_Because of you_

_I learn to play on the safe side so I don't get hurt_

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"A cold front is coming our way but don't worry! Most locations should receive just enough rain to get those begonias just damp enough, so all of you green thumbs out there should keep the watering cans inside today. My seven-day forecast is coming up in just a little bit; back to you, Ted," he says, mugging for the camera.

The screens displaying his weather map flash for an instant, returning to the two anchors just across the set, and Jim returns to his computers, collapsing into the grey rolling chair and sliding backwards across the slate grey concrete floor of the cubicle. Hands weathered by time grasp the grey desk firmly and he pushes himself forward, stomach recoiling against the edge. He types slowly, hunting and pecking for the letters as he uploads them onto the screen, commanding the machine to display numerous graphs and charts and maps filled with scientific mumbo-jumbo that a short fifteen years ago would have been overwhelmingly illegible. Now, they were hopelessly benign.

Massaging his temples as he scoots awkwardly away from the screen, he consults the clock ticking on the desk---thirteen minutes until he was due back onstage---next to the picture of his smiling wife and sons. He allows a grin to escape, left hand still working his headache into hopeful oblivion, right hand tenderly cradling the frame of the picture. This picture was taken nearly ten years ago: October 27, 1981. It was nearly the same time as those misfired firework celebrations that went off Halloween night, no doubt the work of some teenage hooligans hopped up on Darwin knows what.

The ticking clock brings him back to the present without much difficulty, and the ever-present cold front pervades his mind once more. Pain dribbling into every nook and cranny of his cranium, he returns his attention to his notes underneath his arm. He grimaces as he examines them, left hand still working soothing counterclockwise rhythms, right hand holding the pencil-attacked notebook page aloft. All signs point to rain, the paraphrased notes read, but how much is an uncertainty, an unidentifiable variable that sticks out like an unbalanced resultant in a combustion reaction.

"Five minutes, Jim," warns one of the production assistants---George? James? Jack?---and he nods it off curtly. One last glance at a possible storm track on the computer shows significant rainfall for most of the viewing area, but as he rises from the rolling chair, he knows that he will err on the side of caution and tell the public what it wants to hear. Nobody in particular really roots for heavy downpours, so why make them prepare for something that may never happen? No, Jim decides, it is best to let them be surprised by the extravagant rainfall, if it does indeed occur.

Pajama pants swish together as he strides onto the set---the audience only needs to see him from the waist up, after all---and he straightens his tie, waiting for the buck to be passed to him. Just three more minutes, and he would tell them not to worry about the approaching front, that it would be pass just as quickly as it came and all that would result would be a passing mist to---what was it, again---keep the begonias fresh. Best to keep the flower reference consistent, he figures.

As he runs through his forecasted temperatures for the next week in his mind, he can't help but wonder why his headache keeps pounding harder and harder. Aspirin just aren't what they used to be these days.

"And now, meteorologist Jim McGuffin with the weather report. How's the week shaping up, Jim?" Ted offers, and as the camera screens flash to him, the teleprompter provides him with the words he crafted himself, born of the very brain that now seems to throb with every thought that crosses it. He opens his mouth to speak, and his vision blurs so much that the teleprompter's tiny font becomes just as illegible as the charts and graphs and maps on his computer screen would be to his eighteen-year-old self.

"It looks like there's a little rain coming our way, but not much, Ted," he begins, and his head explodes, one hundred tiny needles pushing into the nerve receptors of his brain, forcing each of them to submit messages of pain over and over again. He barely makes it through the weather report with a smile, handing his responsibility over to the sponsors. The public's selective hearing triumphs over truth again.


	15. Boxboy

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but my own imagination. The characters depicted here all belong to J.K. Rowling except for those that I have fabricated for the story's purpose. The song lyric belongs to Kelly Clarkson and company.**

**A/N: NaNoWriMo is over at last, and I am victorious with just a few words over 50,000. Expect more updates out of this now that that elephant has stopped piggybacking with me. Please enjoy.**

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_Because of you_

_I find it hard to trust not only me but everyone around me_

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The homey touches of the Gryffindor Common Room---its welcoming crimson backdrop and soothing, warmth-providing fire---do nothing to assuage the anxiety descending upon its inhabitants. Frog-eyed First Years frantically flip through textbooks, fingers running down the pages as if touch alone would make the desired words jump off of the page and into their minds. The Seventh Years are nowhere to be seen, all hiding in their dormitories, fiendishly scribbling away on whatever parchment is handy and snapping at anyone who came within fifty meters of them. All of the rest in between keep the quiet, worried about their performance on the exams, but overall, not terribly concerned---they are Gryffindors, after all, and they're not about to let a few silly pieces of parchment intimidate them.

Of course, none of them are the Fifth Years, whose mental states lie, predictably, somewhere in between those of the First Years and Seventh Years. Cross-referencing notes from Second Year Potions with that of Fourth Year Herbology to ensure that dragon dung really does act as a catalyst in Strengthening Solutions if applied when the potion simmers after the addition of the knotgrass, they study at a blindingly swift pace, but still find the time, every now and again, to send a gentle, strained smile across the room to a friend when they happen to look up at the same time, or pat the knee of their significant other on the plush crimson sofa when she rubs her temples in frustration at a particularly vexing Arithmancy equation she can't seem to recall completely.

Remus Lupin cannot count himself among those who have a love interest to soothe, to rely on when situations become complicated. It's not as if he isn't interested---his amazingly vivid dreams that leave him panting in the mornings would strongly suggest otherwise---but rather that he doesn't feel like that he could sustain a relationship. He wants to be there at a moment's notice with everything he's got for his girl. If she's hurting, he wants to sweeten her tears; if she's happy, he wants to spin her around; if she's working, he wants to help straighten the shelves.

The scary part is that that's not exactly the problem.

As the full moon draws closer, he changes. He snaps at James for making stupid jokes. Sirius gets harsher punishments for even his more innocent pranks. Poor Peter never gets a word thrown his way, only contemptuous glances. As the hours close in, the anger, that pure primal fury, starts to course within his veins, and he wonders sometimes how it would feel to just rip and tear at the exposed flesh near him---sometimes his own, sometimes his friends', sometimes a complete stranger's---and taste the blood, that sweet crimson nectar, that lifegiving resource that stimulates him far more than any worthless pep pills swarthy Sixth Years offer in undertones to his frazzled yearmates.

The scary part is that that's not exactly the problem.

When he fights the wolf down within himself and takes dominance once more, he finds that he's not entirely disgusted by his thoughts, his instincts, his nearly-carried out actions. Instead, they excite him, almost to the point of arousal.

His mind screams at his heart when his eyes alight upon a potential mate, claiming that he will hurt her, and at the end of the fruitless debate he knows the logic is correct. Whether he means to or not, he knows that even the tenderest love nip can be dangerous at the wrong time. He knows that once he sees her, smells her, the wolf within will stir, and he cannot control that part of him, the part that yearns to mark, to ravage, to claim.

This is why, Friday night after Friday night, Remus Lupin sits in the Common Room doing homework instead of out partying, snogging, or anything remotely social. Sure, usually one of his friends occupies the chair next to him and they talk every now and then, but for the most part he creates a tiny hermitage and rarely moves from it, a turtle safe within the sanctuary that is his shell.

This Friday night comes no differently than any other, except for the apprehension hanging in the room. The permeable walls of his faux fortress absorb the nervousness before it spreads to him; he feels confident in his ability to survive and pass the Ordinary Wizarding Levels with relative ease. Besides, he's not entirely sure he can get a job being what he is, no matter how his O.W.L. results pan out. Surrounding him, sprawled within the boundaries of his seclusion, are his friends. James, eyes crossing behind his glasses, shaggy hair messily mussed, holds back a sigh of frustration, uneager to engage in the taboo that has become of speech. Next to him, contorted in an armchair so that one armrest supports his head and the other his feet, Sirius reads their Charms text from their third year, stopping every now and again to highlight portions with his wand, which he leaves behind his right ear when not in use. Finally, Peter, cross-legged on the floor, attempts to piece together a puzzling Ancient Runes translation, brow furrowed in contemplation as he checks his notes.

It's moments like these where Remus finds himself wondering how he managed to let such good friends waltz into his life, past the boundaries he sets and walls he erects. They truly are Marauders, wandering in, unseen and undetected.

Still, though, it is their actions that remain dubious, shadowed, tenebrous. Sometimes he wonders what would have happened had they not been dormmates, had they not bonded over Peter splitting his knickers as he bent over one autumn morning to fetch a fallen quill. Snivellus---Snape, he reminds himself---landed in another House, and became the object of his friends' diligent persecution. Of course, there were others they teased and bullied (he supposes that's the correct word), but none with the venom that James and Sirius display for the boy.

Every time they encounter him, Remus hangs back, in the shadows, in his tiny little world. The walls solidify and he watches as a helpless observer. Sometimes Snape gives James and Sirius a thrashing, but usually he's caught off-guard and humiliated by the duo. Every time it happens, Snape gets this flicker of a look on his face that Remus almost doesn't catch, a sadness personified, until he masks it behind contemptuous insults and comebacks, and Remus almost raises his wand to interfere. All that rises, however, is a crooked eyebrow or a pursed lip, unseen through the opaqueness of his walls, because every time he goes to move, goes to stir that Gryffindor courage, he sees himself in Snape's place, James and Sirius throwing petty insults about his condition that nevertheless slice right through his walls and into his heart.

As he looks upon them now, each of them seeming so benign, so normal inside the walls of his tiny tenement, he realizes he just doesn't have the faith he needs to trust them wholly. His secrets they can keep, but betrayal, like the wolf inside of him, can never be housed.


	16. Vermillion Stomach

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but my own imagination. The characters depicted here all belong to J.K. Rowling except for those that I have fabricated for the story's purpose. The song lyric belongs to Kelly Clarkson and company.**

**A/N: Please review.**

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_Because of you_

_I am afraid_

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It's funny, you know. I've lived with Harry for five years now, and never before have I had a legitimate reason to think that he's...you know...gone around the bend. And, you know, if I'm perfectly honest, I, uh, still don't have one.

I know, I know, if I don't have a reason, then why I am treating Harry like shit?

That's the same question I've been asking for the past week.

On Monday, I tripped him as he passed my desk to get Potions ingredients from the cabinet. Dean saw it and elbowed me, causing my knife to slip and cut my index finger instead of the daisy roots I was supposed to be chopping. Of course, one quick charm later (we learned it in First Year Charms to deal with the pesky papercuts to come) and all was fixed. I just wish that I could have waved my wand and make the glare Harry gave me disappear, too.

In Care of Magical Creatures, on Tuesday, we found a huge tank of water awaiting us. Hagrid gave us a quick speech about Hippocampi (the plural of Hippocampus, as Hermione corrected him under her breath) and then had us sketch them. I was having a terrible time trying to draw something that was half-horse, half-fish, but then again, I wasn't really focusing. When Hagrid fed the creatures so that we could have some action poses in our sketchbooks, I sent a Boil-Busting Hex at Harry's behind as he adjusted his position near an oak tree. Hermione, sitting to his right and therefore within my line of sight (unlike Ron, on Harry's left), noticed it in time and countered it with a smart bit of sparks. She gave me a look, but didn't say anything. It's almost like she knew---of course she knew, she's Hermione---why I had done it.

Wednesday came and went rather slowly. Wednesdays mean double History of Magic, which I would usually welcome with arms wide open---heck, we all would! Instead, though, we're staving off the sleepiness and boredom and doing work for all of our other classes. Even Ron cracked the books, bringing his Transfiguration essay with him (Come on, McGonagall! Eighteen inches? She's psycho!). I brought some Potions work, planning to try and memorize exactly how to make a Scintillation Solution. Instead, I spent the whole time cooking up harebrained schemes on how exactly I could get Harry to be bitten by a Mackled Malaclaw.

It wasn't long into Thursday when Harry and I bumped heads---figuratively---again. After three hours of fitful slumber, wherein I dreamt that I was a strawberry trying to avoid being crushed by a massive house-elf's fist, I decided to get up early and get my shower taken before the cattle rush of the rest of the Tower. I grabbed my toiletry bag and made for the showers one floor down. On the way, I passed Harry. I purposefully bashed into his right shoulder as I passed, as if trying to smash out the image of Harry's gaunt, death-filled eyes that had met mine for that brief moment on the stairs.

We didn't clash again until late Friday afternoon. It was Domestics Week, Flitwick had decided, and we split into pairs, given fifteen minutes to study the assigned Charm and present it to the class, describing its function both practically and theoretically. Harry and Ron were partnered to work on Crisping Charms; Neville and I were given the Flash-Freezing Charm. I got the hang of the charm pretty quickly, leaving a petrified Neville to do the talking. For the last ten minutes of our prep time, I kept freezing anything of Harry's I could; I froze his book to the desk, his quill to the notecard he was scribbling on, and his left shoelace to the floor. Harry managed to catch all of them in time without embarrassment. I knew he would; besides, Harry's a master of the Warming Charm.

Yesterday, I tampered Harry's stash of chocolate when he was out flying. All of it now should taste like old socks worn for four days straight.

It's almost eleven-thirty right now, and I haven't done anything nasty to Harry today. I haven't even thought of doing anything nasty, not really. My heart's just not in it.

Okay, okay, my heart was never really in it in the first place.

It's just...

Mum was going on and on about how terrible Harry was and how loopy Dumbledore was getting and reading me embellished quotes and sections from _The Daily Prophet_ and after a while it started to make me think. It made me think that maybe, just maybe, Harry had really meant to sic that snake on Finch-Fletchley in our Second Year, despite his protests to us that it had been an accident, that he'd been really trying to call it off. Maybe, I started to think, maybe Harry planned out the whole thing about the Sorcerer's Stone with Quirrell and Quirrell's really alive somewhere.

Then, naturally, my mind arrived to the conclusion that Cedric Diggory must have found it all out somehow. He must have found some sort of damning evidence on Harry, and confronted him about it, and Harry planned the whole thing in the Maze to get rid of him.

Yes, that had to be it, I had thought, and being away from Harry, locked away in my childhood home, it was so easy to believe that Harry was capable of all of those terrible things I started accusing him of in my mind. It was so easy to blame him. Stupid Harry and his top-of-the-line brooms that just land at his feet. Stupid Harry and his perfect friends that support him through thick and thin. Stupid Harry and his ability to come out of everything smelling like roses.

But now?

Now I pass Harry in the corridors, or in the dorms, or in the Common Room, and it's all I can do to think of something stupidly rude to him to keep up my "I hate you" Harry routine. At first, he traded barbs with me, but after I called him a "poopy-faced poop eater" the third day into this whole façade, I think he cottoned on to why I'm doing this.

Y'see, I may be a Gryffindor, but the real reason I'm doing this---still---is because...

...Merlin, this isn't easy...

...it's because I'm scared, all right?

I, Seamus Finnigan, am scared to death to tell my friend that I believe him. I'm afraid to tell him that I know he could never kill an innocent guy like Cedric. I'm afraid of what everybody thinks of me now that I'm the asshole in the year. I'm afraid of what he's going to say to me when I tell him I was an idiot. I'm afraid to admit that You-Know...Voldemort...is back.

I know I'll tell him.

Well...

Eventually.

Until then, I'm going to just sit here on my bed and listen to Dean's whinnying, Ron's foghorn, Neville's whistle, and Harry's mumblings. It's midnight, now, so it'll probably be at least three or four more hours before I pass out from fatigue. I won't sleep for long.

I should remember to put that Itching Powder in Harry's boxers when everybody's at breakfast.


	17. Shades of Silver and Black

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but my own imagination. The characters depicted here all belong to J.K. Rowling except for those that I have fabricated for the story's purpose. The song lyric belongs to Kelly Clarkson and company.**

**A/N: I hope you truly enjoy this one. Please review.**

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_I watched you die_

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It was a plan nearly a year in the making, finally culminating in the kidnapping of one Harry Potter. I advised my Master that it may be wiser to use the blood of any of our common enemies, but he insisted on Harry's. I found it worthless---as usual---to argue at the time, and even now. My Master is far smarter than I ever was, am, or will be. He surely has a reason for using Harry's blood, and if He ever wants me to know it, then He will share that reason with me.

I admit, though, that the likelihood of that happening is unlikely. It has been nearly two years since my Lord gained a corporeal, human form similar to that which He had when He was thwarted by Harry that fateful night in Godric's Hollow. In those two years, He has not seen fit to inform me yet, and so I am confident that He probably never will.

Honestly, though, I am quite fine with that. The less I know, the smaller the amount of information within me that can be tortured out of me by the Ministry. Most of my missions involve "cloak and dagger" spying exercises on my fellows, anyway, so I am rarely given any information of relevance that they would desire. It is of no consequence, however; I would be tortured to within a centimeter of my sanity, then murdered by one of my fellow followers to prevent me from leaking any further information. I might even get killed before the torture regime would be slated to begin. My Lord's influences stretch far and wide.

It is due to my Lord's amazing realm of influence that he was able to regain his body that night in the graveyard. Although my Lord is talented in many areas and one of, if not the most well-read in the Wizarding World, the precise details of the ritual were not foremost in His mind. Therefore, He called in a loyal expert, Devan Landerlow. Landerlow has come to my Master's side only when the gold provides; he has no Mark. In both previous instances, I was the one to request the gold at Gringotts, and it was quite the tidy sum.

Landerlow found the grimoire that my Master had read years earlier and adapted the ritual described therein, using it as a reference point for the disgusting event to come. Landerlow and his associates had no desire---and my Master had no interest in purchasing more of his time---to actually perform it, so the job fell to me, by default. Although I take great pride in the fact that I am one of the only ones to heed my Master's call and faithfully return to His side, I do wish that I had not have had to perform the ritual that night.

There were several things about the ritual that I both disliked then and regret now, although I really had no choice in the matter---it was either obey or die at the jaws of Nagini. First, the ritual required me to prepare a complicated potion. My Master inspected the ingredients I had managed to procure, and deemed several preparations of them unworthy until I finally, after one month, mustered the perfect set, which I then improperly stored, and had to start all over again. That Cruciatus session hurt.

Second, I disliked the portion of the ritual where I was to sacrifice my own appendage, but my Master assured me that I would be rewarded for my actions. I remained leery about the entire process until the time came to speak the magical words that would scape the admissions to the cauldron. Then, my Gryffindor instincts kicked in, and I found the strength to release my hand from its service to me. Although I revel in my new hand's superior ability, its etherealness gives me pause sometimes. It is just as solid and functional as a normal hand should be, but everytime I cast a spell---which, admittedly, isn't often---with it, I find the magic course through the fingers themselves. It is as if a ghost is tickling you with Augurey feathers.

Finally, I regret the words my Master spoke to me: "Kill the spare." With those words, I cast my first Killing Curse in my lifetime. The fair-haired boy crumpled. Harry screamed. The life debt I owed to him burned in my veins, but I gritted my teeth, knowing I had a duty to uphold. My actions seemed nearly scripted as I went through the ritual. My mind kept vomiting up images of the fair-haired boy's possible future that I had denied him: playing and laughing with children flying around him on toy broomsticks; dueling against figures cloaked in shadow, brilliant orange flashes repelling all attackers; the boy, wearing glasses, standing underneath an oak tree, hair suddenly darkened to a black hue and much shaggier than before, kissing a red-haired woman with the greenest eyes I had ever seen in my life...

It is for that reason that I am here on the Hogwarts grounds tonight. I clutch three black roses in my human hand, nicked from Greenhouse Two. In front of me lay a simple granite stone, inlet with the boy's name, Cedric Diggory. Underneath the dates of his birth and death, a simple quotation dares to sum up his life: "Champion of Honour, Warrior of Justice."

I set the three roses atop the headstone, then step back and regard the gravestone. Just another body left in my wake, I rationalise, although I know in my heart that it's not the whole story.

A twig snaps, and in an instant I transform, speeding away, just like always.


	18. Hear Me

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but my own imagination. The characters depicted here all belong to J.K. Rowling except for those that I have fabricated for the story's purpose. The song lyric belongs to Kelly Clarkson and company.**

**A/N: Please enjoy, and please review.**

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_I heard you cry, every night, in your sleep_

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"CEDRIC! _CEDRIC!" _he shouts.

I groan and roll over, squinting to make out the bright red numbers in the darkness. 2:41 A.M. Just like usual.

I crawl into bed at around midnight most nights, when I'm not out with the guys. As soon as my head hits the pillow, I drop into sleep, but about an hour later, screams rip me from my sleep. It's my cousin, just down the hall, having nightmares for the twentieth straight night.

He stops after five minutes or so, and I usually manage to get back to sleep after some general cursing and griping. An hour and a half later, the screams start up again, and I shove a pillow over my ears. It doesn't drown out the noise so well, but eventually he shuts up and I can get back to sleep.

It doesn't last long. Another hour and a half, and the screams start again. At this point every night, I throw off the covers and almost get to my feet. Before I reach the doorknob, though, the screams always change.

Sometimes they get louder. Sometimes his voice gets more desperate. Sometimes he starts screaming for his Mum and Dad. Whatever it is, it always makes me stop in my tracks.

It's like he won't shut up. Like he can't shut up. Like there's something so bad that he's gone through that he's got to scream it out in the middle of the night for all of bloody Little Whinging to hear. Of course, I'm usually the only one listening. Mum and Dad could sleep through a nuclear bomb.

I listen all the way back to my bed. I listen as the screams stop. I listen to the sound of cars going by for another hour and a half until the screams start for a fourth time; the fourth time is always the longest. I listen as they finally stop, and then I go back to bed, but even as I sleep, I'm listening for the beeping of the alarm clock.

I don't really know what it is that screwed him up so bad. Most likely he's a poof---I can't tell---and his boyfriend cheated on him or something.

I don't really give a flying fuck.

I just wish he'd shut up so I can get some sleep.


	19. The Impetuousness of Youth

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but my own imagination. The characters depicted here all belong to J.K. Rowling except for those that I have fabricated for the story's purpose. The song lyric belongs to Kelly Clarkson and company.**

**A/N: This one's a bit of a pottymouthed chapter, but I think you'll enjoy.**

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_I was so young_

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Looking back, I'm really surprised that Potter and his friends didn't flay me alive for all that I did to them. In my own defense, I only antagonized them because it was just so damned easy to get a rise out of them. Father always taught me to exploit others' weaknesses whenever possible, so when I got to Hogwarts, I quickly applied that lesson.

Of course, it didn't hurt that Potter decided to be an asshole on the train and pick Weasley over me. I guess I was a bit of a prat (yes, I admit it, stop faking a heart attack), but still, Potter's a moron for not choosing me. Look at it logically; I can offer powerful allies, nearly unlimited resources, and a stronghold, Malfoy Manor. What's Weasley got to offer? His inferiority complex? An easy-to-manipulate temper? He's pathetic. He was pathetic then, and he's still pathetic now. I bet Granger has to remind him to wipe his ass after he takes a shit.

It was so blindingly obvious all throughout my Hogwarts years that the two of them would end up fucking each other and spitting out brats faster than oversexed rabbits. Which they have. At least they didn't give them tribute names like 'Albus' and 'James'. Sure, he gave the one brat 'Severus' for a middle name, but not a first name. No, never a first name; a Slytherin doesn't deserve to be memorialized that way, in their pea brains. What a load of Mooncalf dung.

Speaking of Severus, I'm really not all that surprised that he was a spy. Sure, he was overindulgent with us Slytherins, and that usually hoodwinked people into thinking that he was rotten through and through. Still, once you love a Mudblood, you get tainted, and when he fell for Potter's mother, everything went to hell in a handbasket. It's a shame. He had real talent.

Talent's not something I ever attributed to Potter, or his friends. Granger was just a living dictionary, Weasley a lucky son of a bitch at Quidditch. Potter was lucky at everything, too. It got handed to him on a silver platter---heck, it still does---and all he had to do was read the signs to figure out what to do. Anytime something went wonky for him, somebody else came along to bail him out, usually Granger or Dumbledore.

The only time Potter wasn't really bailed out was when he cursed me with that Dark curse of his, Sectumsempra. I was having one of my particularly trying moments---if you want to say anything about it, you try being ordered by the Dark Lord to kill your Headmaster and see if you make it through it with your sanity intact---and Potter caught me in the midst of being weak. I can't stand to let people know I'm weak, so naturally I decided to try and clam him up. Of course, Cruciatus was probably the wrong spell to choose, but I was a bit hysterical and not really thinking straight. I wanted to take my frustration out on something, and Potter was the perfect target.

I didn't count on getting nailed by a Dark curse, though. Although I'll never tell him to his face, Potter's got a knack for the pain spells. Aunt Bellatrix always regaled us with the Ministry story (since she was the only of the Death Eaters to come out of that shithole smelling like roses) from my Fifth Year. She said Potter tried to cast Cruciatus on him, and that it sucked. Of course, no Slytherin likes to reveal their weaknesses, so I bet you anything she was lying through her teeth. Potter probably can't maintain the spell worth shit, but one good hit with Cruciatus can seriously fuck you up. I should know.

From the age of six to the age of fifteen, my father put me through rigorous training sessions for everything: flying, astronomy, Transfiguration, etiquette, Dark Arts, healing, Charms, acting, Runes...you name it, I learned it. Whenever I screwed up, Father or the tutors would punish me, harshly. Sometimes it was physical torture, like a whipping. Usually it was the lesser pain curses, although Father was unafraid to use Cruciatus when I fucked up really badly. Once, I miscast a healing charm on an iguana with a broken leg and instead turned it into a bright yellow frog. I screamed for a whole minute for that one.

Whenever I have a pensive moment to look back on things, it does seem like my youth has past in the span of a minute. I say good riddance to it. I am a man now, free of the tethers of my past, free to do whatever I like and say whatever I like, within the bounds of reason and social grace. I choose to give Potter begrudging respect because he deserves it. I choose to curse the remaining Weasleys under my breath whenever I see a redhead because they're a family of blood traitors, and I believe blood traitors are lower than scum.

I choose my own path because I can. No longer am I an impressionable young boy who can be made and manipulated to do what others want. It is time for me to pull the marionette strings.

* * *

**A/N: Please review!**


	20. Dark Humor

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but my own imagination. The characters depicted here all belong to J.K. Rowling except for those that I have fabricated for the story's purpose. The song lyric belongs to Kelly Clarkson and company.**

**A/N: Ladies, I think you'll like this woman. Please enjoy.**

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_You should have known better than to lean on me_

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This must be what it feels like to be a Muggle during a blackout. I've read accounts and reports where the power wasn't restored for days at a time. People ran rampant in the streets, ransacking any stores and boutiques within reach, freed of the fear of being caught in the act by security cameras or alarms.

Here, the world is not so chaotic; in actuality, it's very regimented. They come, they torture me, they heal me, they feed me, they torture me some more, they leave, and I embrace the darkness. It repeats like a compact disc set to the function, like the spin cycle on a washing machine, like the sun setting and being replaced by the darkness of a new moon.

There are no windows in this place. The only source of light in the room is the vague luminescence of the various skeletons scattered about the floor. I see them when the blackness of my pupils recedes and in the flashes of light from their wands.

It amazes me that, despite all of our amazing potential as wizards and witches, we still cannot find a way to make magic coincide with electricity. I suppose it's reflective of our relationship with Muggles; until we, as a united community, can extend an olive branch to the Muggles and include them in our society, it will never come to be.

It's ironic, really. These Pureblood scum claim that Muggle-borns are holding back the Wizarding society, when in reality it is their elitist views that prevent us from advancing with the implementation of various Muggle technologies that could, possibly, save lives. At the very least, it could make many wizards more comfortable, including the Purebloods, who love their comforts above nearly everything else.

It is this point of view that I hold that has condemned me to this shadowed place. It is also the reason I'm bleeding internally. One of my torturers asked me one day if I wished to recant the statements I made in the_ Daily Prophet _defending Muggle-borns. I told him I'd rather eat my own spleen.

Naturally, he obliged me by Summoning my spleen out of my body. I wasn't sure that one could actually do that, but apparently, under the right conditions of distance (he was practically on top of me) and power, it's possible. Luckily for him, there was a healer on hand to remedy his damage, but the torture session ended earlier than normal. Since then, I've been hearing whispered murmurs about how my body refuses to last any longer, despite all the healing. I will need St. Mungo's, the whispers say, if I am to survive to withstand more pain.

Therefore, it is no surprise to me that I am standing in front of the supposed "Dark Lord" himself, Voldemort. We have had an interesting conversation.

"Ah, Miss Burbage. How wonderful to make your acquaintance," the monster hissed at me, his gargantuan pet snake coiling around the hem of his jet black robes.

"Enchantée," I spat. He has brought none of his henchmen with him, or else I would have expected a kick to the stomach for that cheek.

"And you still retain your manners? How intriguing. I will have to inform my Death Eaters that they are not as swift at breaking prisoners as they once were," he mused, beginning to pace, albeit a safe distance from me.

Even now, he works in the realm of disabling fear: the pace to intimidate me, the off-handedness to disconcert and depress me, and the distance to ensure my fighting spirit does not heroically command my body to attack him physically. As much as I would love for that to be the case, I know it cannot, nor ever will be. They have broken my body in record time.

"Just the other morning, I was reading the _Daily Prophet_, and you know what I found, Miss Burbage?" he asks.

"You've become myopic as a direct result of thieving Harry Potter's blood?" I snipe. He laughs, a hollow sound devoid of all mirth.

"Clever, my dear, but incorrect. No, I found this interesting little piece of yours, wherein you say that Mudbloods are worthy of studying magic. It interested me that an intelligent woman such as yourself could purport such a terribly flawed argument," he observes, blithely pulling his wand out from within his dark as night attire.

"Things aren't flawed because you proclaim them to be, Voldemort," I fling. Somewhere within myself, this spirit lives and rages. I don't know where it hides. Obviously not in my spleen.

"My poor, deluded professor," he whispers, smiling wide. It is like the gaping maw of a shark bearing down upon you: an abyss of death.

"Any last words?" he asks me. Were it anyone else, it could have been considered sweet. I know it to be the charity of the hitchhiking scorpion stinging the frog halfway across the river.

"Go suck yourself," I say. Then I break into laughter, knowing the pain that floods my body because of it will be ending soon. I laugh, watching him recoil in annoyance. I laugh, knowing that I unnerve him. I laugh, watching him raise his wand. I laugh, waiting for the dark flash of light that will snuff out my spirit.

I laugh the last laugh.


	21. Double Act

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but my own imagination. The characters depicted here all belong to J.K. Rowling except for those that I have fabricated for the story's purpose. The song lyric belongs to Kelly Clarkson and company.**

**Author's Note: ****This character never reveals his name, but you should be able to figure out who he is. This is more of a character sketch than anything, but there you are. Enjoy.**

**Author's Note, Part II: Please find it within yourselves to leave a review! I'm not picky; you can recite verses from "The Jabberwocky" if you so desire. Just please let me know that you're reading.**

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_You never thought of anyone else_

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It is only by extreme fortune, or perhaps misfortune, as the case may be, that I find myself staring at this wondrous relic that lies open and active before me. For the past hour, I have amused myself with activities I thought that I had left with a younger version of myself: checking to see if students (including Potter, although I needn't have worried, for after our little encounter he eventually returned to Gryffindor Tower) were skulking about the corridors, seeing who Peeves had decided to grace with his chaotic presence today (surely not me, ever since he was reminded what I did to nosy eavesdroppers), and even watching the various staircases rotate around the castle.

This sort of activity, seemingly aimless to the fool's eye, was one I performed with both eagerness and trepidation. At first, I doubted the artifact's usefulness; it most likely didn't work as it was supposed to, or only functioned for a short instance, like a mediocre wizard's conjuring spell. Never before have I been more enthused to be proven incorrect. When my Master succeeds in his resurrection and releases me from this despicable impersonation act, he will be most pleased to possess yet another eye within Hogwarts Castle.

I could scarcely believe it when my Master last came to release me from servitude. Father was no match for a man of his prowess, even considering the terrible form he must maintain now, and then, to be able to live. But live my Master did and does, scrabbling away from the jaws of Death triumphant!

He released me from Father's Imperius Curse and informed me that He had deliberately sought me out, seeing as I was the only one who remained loyal to Him (and also intelligent enough to escape the as of yet untouchable fortress that was Azkaban, although I admit to myself that it was not my own doing, entirely). I immediately proclaimed my worthlessness and my sincere sorrow that I could not have been more useful to Him, and He did find it within His fancy to punish me for that. It was sweet, sweet torture to be underneath His Cruciatus again. Nobody uses the Curse like He does; nobody else can get me to scream like that.

It was invigorating, and He knew that.

When I had a moment to myself to reflect, I found myself awed that my Master would seek me out, above all the others—above slithery Lucius, who never allowed himself to be caught except in the most innocuous of situations; above crafty Severus, the only one of us daring enough to worm his way into Dumbledore's pathetically weak heart; above the talented, yet imprisoned, Lestranges, who both worked with frightful efficiency, especially regarding prisoners and those to be tortured. Never once did He think that another servant, not even the disgusting Pettigrew, could perform the duties He required of me with the finesse He so obviously wished.

It has not been an easy road: detaining my most respected nemesis, Alastor Moody; leading the guileless and brainless Potter (How could he have ever overwhelmed my Master? The whelp possesses barely enough sense to fill an eggcup!) into and through the Tournament thus far; resisting from cursing Severus and Igor on sight for their treachery (Severus for not returning immediately to my Master's side when he so obviously knew my Master could not have been slain by such a foolish little child, and Igor for deserting us during the Liverpool raids); and not slaughtering the imprudent Malfoy brat or the gormless Longbottom boy for their inability to take a hint! How laborious it has been guiding them like simple cattle along their merry little way without even a crook or a dog with which to correct them!

Nevertheless, I shall continue to perform this task for my Master, for He demands it and He has faith that I will complete the task with my incomparable acumen.

After all, I am the Chosen One.


	22. Echo's Torturous Pleas

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but my own imagination. The characters depicted here all belong to J.K. Rowling except for those that I have fabricated for the story's purpose. The song lyric belongs to Kelly Clarkson and company.**

**Author's Note: ****This character never reveals his name, either, but it should be obvious who he is. I have to admit that this chapter pained me, as I dislike writing slash, but the idea latched on and refused to let go, so here you are. Please enjoy.**

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_You just saw your pain_

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I told him that I wished for socks. Of all the things in this world I could hope for, I chose socks.

Of course, there is a reason. On my eighteenth birthday, he gave me a pair of woolen socks. I was initially bemused by the gift, finding it rather tawdry for Gellert's tastes, until he confessed to me shortly thereafter that he had sewn them himself.

By hand.

I found myself perfectly amazed that Gellert would do such a thing. He hated the Muggles with such an ardent passion, and yet he claimed that he had sewn the socks himself with ordinary, Muggle knitting needles. I had been floored at the time, and showed my appreciation in ways that, to this day, still make me blush when I recall them.

I have thought about putting them within my Pensieve so that they do not cast across my thoughts as vividly, or as often, but I think that would be poisonous. To taint the memory and innocence of those days is comparable to boxing poor Neville Longbottom's ears; you daren't do it, for any reason whatsoever, because the recipient is so pathetic and innocent. Therefore, in my deeper recollections, I come upon them and smile or blush, as the case may be, then move along with my thoughts.

This night, however, seems to defy this command I have set for myself, for I have seen my heart's desire once more within this cursed Mirror that stands before me. Indeed, I warded young Harry away from it, seeing in his green irises the same anguish that was reflected in my own so many years ago.

I defeated him, and claimed the Elder Wand for my own, but I had not killed him. I stood over him, both wands trained to his throat.

"Go on, Albus," he said slowly, daring to use the tenderness he had reserved for our most private moments, "Do what you feel you must."

The scoundrel must have known I had not the heart to slay him, for I instead tightened his _Incarcerous_-made bindings and waited for the Ministries to arrive and settle the matter. In all the commotion, afterward, I never found the time and clarity I needed to say a proper good-bye to him. No, not to him, but to the man I had once loved; to the man this monster had destroyed with false ideologies.

I daresay that all of this swept past my mind rather swiftly, for I recall speaking words to young Harry before sending him along, and before uttering my desire for socks. I made it a point not to lie to the young fellow, for I do indeed see some semblance of socks in the Mirror right now.

I see Gellert, youthful and naive, in his favorite plush red armchair, the one with the high back that he remarked made him feel like a king. He sits there, darning the socks carefully and lovingly. Every now and again he looks up and beams that beautiful, innocent smile he had, then returns to his work.

I know this never will happen just as I know that it never had. Seemingly aeons ago although I recall it with astounding clarity, it took my fancy while I was transferring my most precious artifacts, which I did not trust to even the sturdy House-Elves, to withdraw the socks Gellert had given for me. I peered at them for a while, then performed the diagnostic charm I had learned a few days ago that would reveal all magical influence on an object. It only worked for a few spells, of course, so the criterion was that the object could not have had many significant encounters with magic; I was sure that I had not touched the socks even once with my wand, never repaired a single thread that I had once been so confident that Gellert had touched with his own slender digits.

My fears then were acknowledged: the socks had been sewn by a charm. Overcome with annoyance and betrayal---of both his trust and my own, of him---I rent the socks apart with my hands, repaired them with my wand, and repeated to put them through magical torture, using every charm I could think of to mar them to the point of almost no return. Every time, however, I repaired them, and, in the end, I could not bring myself to Vanish them away. Even Gellert's spellwork I could not eviscerate.

Many times, I have been nearly convinced to destroy this Mirror. It stands to aid nobody, only perhaps the one who is pure of heart and mind that requires the Stone, but that person should never have to utilize this vile contraption. There are other ways, other methods, other spells that can hide the Stone just as competently.

Yet the Mirror still remains. I draw the sheet over it with my wand and turn on my heel. Tomorrow I will have the House-Elves move it to its proper location on the third floor.

His youthful version would implore me to abate the pain this notion of him causes me. The elder would call it a telling weakness.

I call it love.


	23. Grey Noise

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but my own imagination. The characters depicted here all belong to J.K. Rowling except for those that I have fabricated for the story's purpose. The song lyric belongs to Kelly Clarkson and company.**

**Author's Note: ****Sorry I haven't updated for so long. Fabric of Maturation has been sucking the life out of me, but in a good way! This chapter went through a revision after it was halfway written. It's the first one that's gotten a good once-over before posting, and I love it. Enjoy!**

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_And now I cry, in the middle of the night, for the same damn thing_

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_(There's so. Much. Noise.)_

When I had my first seizure, I learned several things.

One: I'm sensitive to light and sound. Too much white and my eyes will start casting funny patterns on things like it did all that day. Too many voices screaming in my ear and my head will start to spin and throb.

_(Like it is now. It's like a battering ram against the skull with every beat of every song. It's like wanting to kiss him so badly but knowing I can't. Knowing he'll reject me just like I've been doing to him all this time. Knowing everything's wrong and so devilishly right at once.)_

Two: I'm remarkably calm, when the pressure is on. I woke up totally disoriented, with people carrying me on either side of me. They were asking questions as I stirred:

"Lily, are you okay?"

"Does your head hurt?"

"How many fingers am I holding up?"

I found my responses surprisingly lucid and controlled:

"I've been better."

"Only when you poke it like that."

"I know it's really three, but it looks like six."

It didn't hurt that I could see his face amongst the throng of concerned visages, either.

_(But I'm not calm, now. I don't feel it, anyway. He's in all black for the first time and his hazel eyes are just slicing into me. It's like a sharp knife through melting butter. He's the knife, so dapper, so beautifully crisp. I'm the butter, melting in his fictional embrace. The embrace I wish I could have.)_

Three: If I take on too much stuff, my body will let me know. I was so overworked with singing in the choir and schoolwork and planning the Easter Formal that I didn't have enough to run on anymore. I wasn't eating very well, and when I was it was a hasty bite before rushing off to do something else.

_(Nothing changed, though. My grades didn't slip. My singing never faltered. Nobody knew that there was anything wrong with me, except him. He saw me grimacing in class and came up to me as we were leaving. Asked me if I was alright, if I needed to see Pomfrey. I waved his sweetness aside before I did something rash like kissing him.)_

Four: There are some things that just can't be understood. Pomfrey didn't have a clue what was wrong with me. She did all sorts of charms and diagnostic checks and shoved at least a dozen potions down my gullet. She even consulted some of her associates at St. Mungo's. They Flooed in and did all the same things, in all the same order, but there was nothing doing. My seizure was a mystery.

_(Like him. Like when he leans forward and for half a second I think he's going to kiss me. Then I realize he's just adjusting his posture. Like when he gets quiet and asks me a question about life, and about love, and all I want to do is show him the answer. Like when I'm sitting on my bed crying because I can't figure out what he meant by that grin or that gesture or that off-hand comment.)_

But the most important thing of all was five: I can't do this alone. I can't keep going through life without having someone love me. Not like my parents, or my friends, or even my professors, maybe; I need someone to love me. Someone to make love to me, when we're ready.

_(I need him. I can't see him laughing and not want to be the reason behind it. I can't watch him struggle on an exam and not want to help. Can't not want to run my fingers through his hair and see if it was as soft as I thought. Can't stay away. Can't not love.)_

I learned all these things, but I haven't had a chance to use the knowledge.

_(Now I do. We're at the Formal and he's holding out his hand to me to dance.)_

"A girl who looks as pretty as you do should be out there showing it off," he said, smiling.

_(And for a moment, I leave his hand in the air. Then I flip the bird to the part of me that's been too afraid to love him and give in. I am the clay, and he is the Potter.)_

People are talking, whispering, but I can't hear the noise anymore. I can't even hear the music that's pushing us along on the floor. All I hear is the rhythm of our heartbeats, pumping out life's melody. It's the key I've been looking for all along.

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**Author's Note: Like? Hate? See something that can be improved? Review!**


	24. Victim Number 826

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but my own imagination. The characters depicted here all belong to J.K. Rowling except for those that I have fabricated for the story's purpose. The song lyric belongs to Kelly Clarkson and company.**

**Author's Note: ****Another horridly late update. I started this piece a few weeks ago, then forgot what I was doing with it. Luckily, tonight inspiration hit and I ran with it. I like it. Please read, and please review!**

* * *

_Because of you_

_I never stray too far from the sidewalk_

* * *

The streets are not safe for a wizard in these times. I know that. But I walk them anyway.

Instead of Apparating to the Ministry phone booth, or somewhere very close by, I Apparate a few blocks away and walk through Muggle London. It gives me a chance to ruminate, and to enjoy the sights that the Muggle world has to offer.

Every day I pass the same boutiques: a jewellery store where an overweight woman who wears far too much blush tries to get me to buy her latest trinket; a florist whose flowers stir my hay fever; a watch-maker whose face I've never seen, and so on, for the four blocks that I walk.

These trips through the Muggle world give me a talking point with Arthur at the family get-togethers, at the very least. That man is obsessed with Muggles, I swear. I'm surprised he didn't marry one.

Well, if any girl could turn a guy's head, it's my Molly.

It's funny. Fabe fell for a blonde. I fell for a brunette. Molly fell for a redhead. Maybe it's like Mum said: a Prewett can never settle for just one thing, they've always gotta have it all. At least, that's how she explained having four-course meals every night. The woman loved to cook.

Merlin, I miss her.

I'm just past the jeweler and getting to the florist when I hear the screams.

Merlin, not again.

He's _here?_ In Muggle London again? He can't keep this to his own world, he has to terrorize the rest of them as well?

In the span of five seconds I've got my wand out, have sent my Patronus to the rest of the Order, and have run off of my sidewalk and into the intersection of the two streets.

There they are, all five of them. Making their way up the street to the left of my sidewalk, they're cursing anything - or anyone - that gets in their way. One boy, who can't be much older than ten, is being made to strangle his little sister. And they're _laughing_.

This is all sport to them.

I don't think I've ever been closer to vomiting out of revulsion than I am now.

I take one quick look down the right-hand side of the street: screaming Muggles, but out of terror and not pain. They're scrambling for their vehicles - one of their contraptions makes a loud noise as it whizzes past me, careening for an exit.

Well.

If they need a way out, I'm going to make damned sure they've got one.

"Oy! Shit-for-brains! Why don't you try on a real wizard for size, eh?" I yell.

Antagonizing them is always the best way to get their attention.

If not the wisest.

Five spirals of light fly my way, and I have to Levitate myself into the air to dodge them. From above, I land a volley of spells: two Stunners, a gust of gale force wind to scatter to them, and a Cushioning Charm to take the impact as I slam into the ground.

While they're dazed from the wind and I from my re-acquaintance with the ground, the boy who's just killed his own sister snaps free from his Imperius. He looks around, then down at the body of his limp sister.

His face stirs me to my feet faster than any professor or Auror commander ever could.

I fire off curse after curse, constantly in motion, never letting them get an easy target. My aim is off, but I don't care; I have to keep them distracted so the Muggles can get away. Once the streets are clear, I can try and pick them off.

I've at least got to hold until back-up arrives.

I slam against the wall; damn gale force right back on me. I spin away, using the wall to push off and fling a Jelly-Legs curse their way. It connects with one of them, who yells out a curse.

It's Dolohov.

Of course it's fucking Dolohov. Whenever his master sends out a troop of idiots to terrorize the Muggles, Dolohov always leads it.

That asshole.

I spin, roll, dash, and curse. The hits I've taken are minor; a cut here, a bruise there.

One of them is retreating. What's he up to?

I can't think more - four Killing Curses my way. I've got to Summon a trash can lid to take the hits coming for my chest.

_Pop!_

Fabian!

"Fabian!" I yell.

"Hey, brother!" he screams back, firing a couple of nonverbal spells into the Death Eaters' throng.

We say no more. Together we try to turn the tide, try to fell at least one of these fools to even the odds. But none of our spells seem to connect; they are just as nimble as we, and I'm starting to tire out.

The one in the back fires off a blue pentagon into the sky.

Damnit!

Anti-Apparation ward! Fuck, fuck, fuck.

Backup's going to take at least ten more minutes now, and I can't hang on for that long!

But maybe Fabe can.

A Stunner - Fabe's - catches one of the Death Eaters at last. Four on two.

We trade spells. I'm getting tired and getting slow, so I start bringing up the shields. Fabe can fire the offense off; I need to take a break. Let them try and get through these; they're too obscure to be felled by a simple _Finite_.

I turn my back quickly to check on the street - it's okay because I chose an encapsulating shield, not a one-way. There seems to be nobody around. Good. They've all gone.

Except for the boy, I remember, as I turn around. He's still there, sobbing over his sister's body, barely watching us. It's going to scare him out of his wits, probably, but this is best, I tell myself, as I conjure two brick walls in a V-formation in front of him. The Death Eaters aren't looking behind them; they think my curse missed. Fools, all.

My shield is weakening. I catch Fabe's eye for a second.

It's time to end this.

I let the energy out of the shield and channel it into a fireball. It scorches and roasts one of them alive; the others manage Flame-Freezing Charms when they see my charmwork. Fabe picks off another that dodges clumsily with a Stunner.

I spin to dodge a Cruciatus and fling back a simple Lumos. We're in close enough range now that it should be blinding, and it is.

To Dolohov, to the other idiot, and to Fabe.

I quickly extinguish it. Dolohov fires a Killing Curse in the dark. I scream, but it's too late.

Now it's two on one.

It's time to end this for good.

I run forward, into as close quarters as I can get. The still-dazed Death Eater takes my uppercut and collapses like a house of cards. Dolohov fires a spell but it goes wide.

Stunner. Miss.

Killing Curse. Wide left.

Stunner. Deflected.

Cruciatus. Far right.

Wingardium Leviosa. Countered.

Killing Curse. Just above the head.

This is getting nowhere.

It's time to gamble.

I cast the Vortex spell. We're close enough that the whirlwind, which is supposed to deprive the lungs of oxygen if you're trapped in it, catches me first. He tries to run, but it catches him. I drop to my knees, wand clattering to the ground. Dolohov follows, wand in hand.

He can't cast, can't breathe. I can't cast, can't breathe.

I'm choking. He's choking.

I can do nothing but lay back, look up, and wait for the end. I see the blue pentagon still in place, but it's fading. When it breaks, I hear the pops of Apparation.

One is very close to me.

"Damn!" someone curses.

Alastor. Of course, he's the first one on the scene. Dolohov must've done a runner.

I let go of the Vortex, but it's too late. I can't speak, can only cough, cough up blood as bright as Molly's beautiful hair.

Oh, Fabe. She's going to be all alone now, Fabe.

No.

She'll have Arthur.

The kid.

The kid!

I raise a shaky hand in the direction of the brick wall. Alastor catches my eyes with his, follows my pointing, and orders two of his number to check it out.

He's waving over the field medic, but it's too late. I'm done for, and I know it.

So does Alastor.

"We'll get him," Alastor promises, his eyes piercing into mine. His face is flickering out of view, but I can see his eyes, and I know it's not an empty promise.

He'll get him. Dolohov and the kid, both.

I nod weakly, let my arm fall, and watch the darkness.

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**Author's Note: Yes, that was Gideon Prewett, brother to Molly Prewett-Weasley and to Fabian Prewett. I daresay he earns his "heroic" death, eh? Please review!**


	25. Good Advice

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but my own imagination. The characters depicted here all belong to J.K. Rowling except for those that I have fabricated for the story's purpose. The song lyric belongs to Kelly Clarkson and company.**

**Author's Note: ****Welcome back. It's time to hit up an old favorite of mine. Please read, and please review!**

* * *

_Because of you_

_I learn to play on the safe side so I don't get hurt_

* * *

All my life I've been told what to do.

_"Neville, don't touch that iron, it's hot!"_

Gran told me what to do because she was looking out for me. I was a clumsy child who would grow into an awkward teen - and she knew that. So every time I would be running in the house or about to do something foolish with a carrot and Uncle Algie's behind, she'd put a stop to it. And although at times - well, most times - I thought she was an overbearing old bat, I was very afraid of bats. I still am. I still can't talk to Vlad, our Defense professor, without feeling a little apprehensive. He only drinks sheep's blood, and I know that, but it's still frightening to see him, knowing what he can turn into.

_"Swish and flick. Just swish and flick. Close your eyes and let your magic take over."_

Professor Flitwick told me what to do because he was looking out for me. I was an inept child who would grow into a scatterbrained teen - and he knew that. So every time I couldn't get a charm in class or in our tutoring sessions three nights a week, he'd guide me through it. And although at times I felt like he was getting annoyed with me, when I got a spell right he'd always smile in that special way that professors have and I'd feel like I'd just had twelve Butterbeers. I'm still working on that smile with my students.

_"You shouldn't let Trevor roam around the castle, Neville, he might get hurt."_

Hermione told me what to do because she was looking out for me. I was a forgetful child who would grow into an absent-minded teen - and she knew that. So every time the Prefects declared new passwords or a professor changed a quiz date, she'd write it down for me and Stick it to the front of my book. And although it took a long time for me to learn how to Un-Stick her Sticking Charms, I never forgot when the next quiz or exam was in any of my classes with her. Of course, passwords were a whole other matter altogether.

_"Think of your happiest memory, Neville. It doesn't even have to be real, but it helps if it is."_

Harry told me what to do because he was looking out for me. I was a weak child who would grow into a strong teen - and he knew that. So every time my Stunner didn't quite come out right or my Shield Charm failed to repel his spell, he'd un-curse me and tell me to keep practicing. And although I think he only worked with me because he was trying to get Ron and Hermione together, I got better. Good enough to be the last man standing at the Ministry, besides Harry himself.

_"When the wintersprig's leaves turn yellow at your touch, there will be a frost the next morning."_

Professor Sprout - Pomona - told me what to do because she was looking out for me. I was a lonely child who would grow into a headstrong adult - and she knew that. So every time we met for our Herbology Club meetings, she made sure to teach me something new. And although I botched a few specimens here and there, on the whole I became one of her best student assistants. Good enough to be the first person she asked to be her successor when she retired four years ago.

_"Don't even think about it, Neville."_

I look out for myself. I'm a Gryffindor, but I don't foolishly take risks. I do the smart thing - the thing that gets no glory - and because of that I'm still alive. I've never dated any girls - Ginny was the closest and all we did was dance together as friends - because I know that I'll get hurt if I pick the wrong one. If she's not interested and I don't figure that out before I ask her, then she'll hurt me, whether she means to or not.

"You should really get the pumpkin cookies, Neville, they're quite good with tea," she says.

"You always know best, Hannah," I agree.

She smiles and heads into the kitchen to get them.

I'm not going to take any risks. I've been coming here every day for the past three months, talking with Hannah. Making sure she's interested. And every day she suggests something new for me to try.

All my life I've been told what to do.

And I couldn't be happier about it.

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**Author's Note: Was that as sweet as those pumpkin cookies Neville's about to enjoy? If so, review! If not, review!**


	26. Red Eyed Hindsight

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but my own imagination. The characters depicted here all belong to J.K. Rowling except for those that I have fabricated for the story's purpose. The song lyric belongs to Kelly Clarkson and company.**

* * *

_Because of you_

_I try my hardest just to forget everything_

* * *

"Remus. Remus, please, I'm begging you."

A frown.

"You know I can't."

Pushes my hand away.

"Please. I can't take it, Remus. Cooped up in this house like an animal - like I'm a real dog. Snuffles Black, a prisoner in his own house!"

Eye-roll.

"Don't be dramatic, Padfoot."

The open-mouthed grin.

"Don't you see, Moony? That's all I've got left. I'm going stir-crazy in this place. I've been trying jokes out on Buckbeak, for Merlin's sake - and let me tell you, a Hippogriff is about the worst audience you'll ever have. They don't appreciate a good fart joke."

A laugh.

"Don't let him hear you say that. I don't Heal as well as I used to."

The shy, humble grin.

"Oh, please, Moony. Your cure for everything was chocolate back then - and it hasn't changed, from what Harry's told me."

Haughty pseudo-sneer.

"I'll have you know, Mr. Black, that chocolate has many valuable medicinal properties that stimulate both the mind and the body in amazing ways. The chemical -"

Stops short.

"Moony, you're gonna put me to sleep. I didn't pay attention in class and I'm not going to now. Trying to educate me...the nerve!"

The open-mouthed grin.

"You're insufferable, Padfoot."

Shakes his head.

"I know. But that's why you love me."

Laughs.

"Look, Sirius, about...earlier. You know if I could, I would, but -"

Stops short.

"I know."

Purses his lips.

"You gonna be alright?"

Brows furrow.

"I'll be fine, Moony."

A frown.

"If you say so."

Eyes on the carpet.

"I'll be fine, Mummy. Now run along and woo your bird."

The shy, humble grin.

"She's not my bird."

Steps forward.

"Like bloody hell she's not!"

Hug.

"I'll see you Friday, Sirius."

Waves.

"Friday, Remus."

Steps into the fireplace.

"If I make it that far, old friend."

He doesn't hear.

"Old friend. Why are you the only one left?"

Doesn't see the cupboard open.

"Why did he do it, Remus?"

Doesn't hear the bottle get unscrewed.

"Why did we let him?"

Doesn't smell the stench of whiskey.

"Why'd you fall for it, James?"

Doesn't taste its medicinal properties.

"Here's to you, Peter. To the boy who died a long time ago."

Doesn't feel it burning out the memories.

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**Author's Note: Please leave a review.**


	27. Shaken and Stirred

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but my own imagination. The characters depicted here all belong to J.K. Rowling except for those that I have fabricated for the story's purpose. The song lyric belongs to Kelly Clarkson and company.**

**Author's Note: ****Welcome back. Please read, and please review!**

* * *

_Because of you_

_I don't know how to let anyone else in_

* * *

The door slams shut behind him. Then, and only then, can I stumble to the nearest chair and sit down.

Force down the memories he's regurgitated into my mind.

I cannot bear them, so I have hidden them. It is easier to shield the mind from attack when your most private memories aren't in the treasure chest. I thought I had hidden them well - neither Albus nor the Dark Lord have found them, or even a hint of a trail to them. I have instructed Albus to never hold back against me, and I trust him enough to know that he does not. Of all people, I would have been the least terrified to have him see them. Minerva, too, if she had any Legilimantic skill.

But who sees them? Who breaks past every defense I thought I had so carefully and skillfully wrought?

None but Harry Potter.

Fitting. Ironic, even. Were I in a more stabler state of mind, I would find this situation amusing. But right now, all I want to do is open this decanter of wine and drown my troubles.

Or stab him a few hundred times, perhaps.

But it would take too much effort to track him down, and his - Lily's - blood would most likely protect him, anyway. Lily always knew how to disable me best.

Where's that damn wine?

I will not teach him further. His ability is too volatile, too instinctive. Potter cannot defend, only attack, and the power of his counterattack will crush any mind that cannot force him out. I barely managed, myself.

And, if I am honest...

I cannot bear to see the boy's face. I know he will pity me - even James, in his best moments, never respected me, only pitied, the idyllic fool - and I cannot bear that. Not from a Potter. Not again.

And yet, if I am honest...

I must see him again. I know I shall. My future hinges on his actions - although I doubt he will be ready to do anything for perhaps ten more years. My freedom centers on this boy. As distasteful as that may be, it is reality.

And still, if I am honest...

I need him here, in these quiet chambers, using Lily's wisdom and insight to probe deep within my brain and point out where I've gone wrong. To help me repair the walls so no others can enter - or perhaps that all may enter, when I am free. To heal me...

Her caresses and hand-squeezing and the way she always looked at me with such hope and promise and maybe somewhere deep inside maybe just maybe it might have been could it have been in my dreams it has been...

Love?

Damn, the bottle's empty already.

Potter will say nothing. Perhaps to his two flunkies, he will confess that he has had a bad evening. But he will not reveal the details. Lily's discretion will prevail over James' glee.

And perhaps I owe him. Not for Lily's hands over his mouth - no, not that. I owe Lily enough.

No, I owe him for reminding me of something:

No matter how hard you try, you cannot hide your heart in your mind.

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**Author's Note: Perhaps a little bland, but I don't really like Severus all too much. Leave a review and tell me what you thought, please!**


	28. Inner Light

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but my own imagination. The characters depicted here (and quoted lines from **_**Deathly Hallows**_**) all belong to J.K. Rowling, except for those that I have fabricated for the story's purpose. The song lyric belongs to Kelly Clarkson and company.**

* * *

_Because of you_

_I'm ashamed of my life because it's empty_

* * *

_"Ron..."_

He tosses.

"_When he broke his wand..."_

He turns.

"_Remember?"_

His head shakes.

"_Remember Ron?"_

He stirs.

"Hermione?" he murmurs into the wintry air.

But no response comes.

His hand immediately flies to the wand inside his sleeping bag, next to his right thigh. Still there - still intact. Still ready to fight.

If there was even a battle left to fight.

"C'mon, Weasley...get it together," he mutters.

He checks the proximity ward.

Nothing.

Maybe Harry and Hermione weren't here after all. Maybe he was just chasing a ball of light into the darkness. Maybe they were gone.

Forever.

"Enough," he mumbles.

He shivers. Night had fallen. He had drifted off into sleep late that afternoon despite tensely awaiting any sign of his friends. The hill had been silent, far too silent, and before he knew it his lids were drooping and night was falling all around him.

Then the dream began. It wasn't much of a dream, not really. Just snippets of a voice - a voice he'd heard so many times, most recently the night before from the Deluminator - a voice he'd probably never hear again.

"Stop," he pleads, feebly.

He can see the stars. He used to love Astronomy. He was hopeless at it, but he used to love watching the heavens. It was like a whole other world up there, a world free from school and brothers and Quidditch matches and Triwizard Cups and Horcruxes.

But now, it was a reminder that he was alone. Cold and alone.

And it was all his fault.

"No," he whispers.

The Horcrux was making them all change. It was evil, he knew that. But evil can't corrupt light - the night sky cannot hide the stars forever. Not unless clouds - the stars' darkness - obscure the light. And he was not without his clouds - none of them were. Clouds he had created, nobody else; clouds the locket fed off of willingly.

Clouds that the Deluminator's light must now be fighting.

"Please," he cries softly.

He reaches near his left thigh and pulls out the Deluminator. It sparkles brightly in the moonlight, and somehow just holding it seems to warm his hand.

"_Ron,"_ the echo comes to his mind - his heart - but not his ears.

But it's enough to make his fingers click the lighter.

A blue light appears, ethereal in the night. It weaves like a Snitch for a few moments. He remains still. He's no Seeker; he can't catch this. He's not Harry.

And just as he thinks this thought, the light enters him and he feels warm everywhere, all at once.

He realizes the thought that he's not Harry doesn't bother him so much, now, except that Harry's with Hermione and he's not.

Two movements of his wand, some muttered Latin, and he's ready to Disapparate.

"I'm coming back," he promises.

The pop of his Disapparation resounds into the night, unheard.

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**Author's Note: Please leave a review.**


	29. One Plus One Equals One

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but my own imagination. The characters depicted here all belong to J.K. Rowling, except for those that I have fabricated for the story's purpose. The song lyric belongs to Kelly Clarkson and company.**

* * *

_Because of you_

_I am afraid_

* * *

George twisted his Cleansweep to a stop and looked down on the Pitch. Oliver had dragged them out to an early practice at five. In. The. Bleeding. Morning. It was now half past seven; they'd not stopped since they'd begun. Not even for breakfast, as his stomach was ever so kind to remind him with a gurgle of protest.

Everybody was here - Katie, Angelina, and Alicia running a hawk formation play; Oliver waiting at the hoops to defend; he and Fred flinging Bludgers to interrupt the girls as often as they could - except Harry. Oliver liked to train him alone sometimes so that Harry could learn Oliver's most dangerous Seeker techniques without anyone in the way.

As much as George liked Harry, right about now he wanted to drag him out of bed, fling him onto a broom, and send him rocketing into the Whomping Willow. He was just an ickle Firstie, after all; the Willow probably wouldn't be able to whack someone so small.

George sighed. Deathwishing wasn't going to whack the Bludgers.

He readied his bat and took off, swinging mightily at an errant Bludger. They were practicing with four today to tighten the Chasers' routes. George thought it was a little crazy of Oliver to have four Bludgers on the field at once, but Oliver was always a little...touched when it came to Quidditch.

Actually, he was a little touched when it came to most things.

George's instincts suddenly told him to duck, and he obeyed. A rogue Bludger went flying over his head.

"Oy! Watch your aim, brother!" he yelled out to Fred, who was staring straight at him.

Fred didn't reply. He flew over to where a Bludger had just missed Alicia and swung.

The Bludger came straight for George's face.

George smacked it, hard. It flew away in an arc, heading for the stands.

"Fred! What the hell!" George screamed, hunkering down on his broom to zoom in on his brother.

Fred flew right, his bat already rearing back to hit a Bludger that had been aimlessly roaming. Fred connected with it; George swerved underneath the shot and continued to close in on him.

"Fred! FRED!" George shrieked.

Still no response.

Fred took aim again, flying further out of George's reach. Again George dodged the Bludger his brother shot his way.

Fred shot again. George flew through the Chasers' pincer formation to outrun a second Bludger hot on his tail, spinning to avoid the first. He felt it rush past his hair.

"George! This isn't Beater-Defend!" Angelina called out. Beater-Defend was when Oliver had Fred and George line up as Chasers for the other team. Sometimes he'd call in a reserve Chaser - a chipper Fourth Year whose name George still couldn't remember - to act as the third.

"Something's wrong with Fred!" George yelled back, spinning left. The Bludger smashed into one of the stand towers.

"Like what?" Katie called, pulling out her wand. Alicia and Angelina did the same. Oliver flew over to join the crowd.

"What's going on?" he asked. "I didn't call time-out. Let's move, girls!"

"George thinks there's something up with Fred," Alicia replied.

"I _know_ there's something wrong with Fred!" George yelled, somersaulting mid-air to duck another Bludger.

The Chasers and Keeper turned as one to their right to watch Fred swing yet another Bludger George's way. They turned left to watch George divert its path with his bat. Then they turned to each other.

"Hawkshead on the Bludger near the goalposts. Capture it at all costs and get it over to me. I know the deactivation charm for it," Oliver ordered. The girls nodded and sped off.

Oliver flew over to George.

"We've got your back," he said. Then he sped over to the goalposts.

George had time for a quick smile of gratitude before speeding away from another oncoming Bludger.

He didn't understand what was going on. He hadn't stolen any girls Fred was interested in. He hadn't pulled a prank on him, or without him. He hadn't done anything to set Fred off, and yet here he was, clearly trying to decapitate his twin.

No, this was not Fred. Fred would _not_ do this. Someone had to have charmed him.

Maybe even...the Imperius Curse.

As George dodged, flew, and whacked, he tried to come up with a possible list of enemies.

Snape. Peeves. The Bloody Baron. McGonagall. Flint. Davies. Diggory. Draco Malfoy.

Snape never came out of the dungeons, as far as George knew, so he seemed unlikely. Peeves and the Baron couldn't cast spells. McGonagall detested them, but she wouldn't stoop so low. Davies and Diggory were Captains of Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff, but they didn't want to win that badly.

That left Malfoy and Flint.

Malfoy - albeit the scum of the earth - had to be innocent. He and Harry were in the same year. No First Year could do a curse like this.

Marcus Flint, though...

Well, that was a possibility. He could have gotten one of the older guys on the team to do it for him, too, like Higgs.

George was decided. Marcus Flint had cursed Fred.

"George!" Oliver called out. Angelina, Katie, and Alicia flew behind him, each holding a Bludger in their hands. George nodded, understanding their plan in an instant, and smacked the final oncoming Bludger over to a waiting Oliver. Oliver slowed its trajectory with an Impediment Jinx, then cast the deactivation charm. The Bludger fell neatly into his left hand.

Now it was George's turn.

With a curt nod of thanks to Oliver, George flew in after his brother.

At first, Fred didn't move. But as George got closer and closer, Fred's eyes widened and he took off. The two chased each other through the pitch, a game of cat-and-mouse that, since they were twins, looked more like a war between a man and himself.

Finally, Fred swerved right and George anticipated the move. He collided with his twin, leaping off of his broom to tackle Fred. They fell as one to the sand of the Pitch below them, Cushioning Charms securing their fall from the rest of the team above.

George wrestled with Fred on the ground, rolling and kicking and punching until he finally pinned Fred's wrists to the ground underneath them.

"Fred! Stop it, Fred! It's me. George. C'mon, Fred," George pleaded, his voice decrescendoing into a whisper. Fred continued to squirm.

Then George caught it.

Dilated pupils. Unfocused eyes. Irises changing colors.

"He's been Confunded!" George yelled out to his teammates. Fred took the moment of distraction to savagely kick George off of him. George crumpled backwards, landing hard on his back.

Fred got to his feet and pulled his wand from his pocket. He leveled it right between George's eyes.

For one terrifying moment, George had no idea what his twin brother was going to do.

Fred's mouth moved, but the curse failed to fall from his lips. Four jets of red light came streaming down from above.

One hit his forehead. One hit his stomach. One went over his head. One was too far left.

Fred collapsed.

George scampered over to his twin, ignoring his sudden headache and stomachache to make sure he was still breathing. Two Stunners could do a lot of damage if they hit in the right spots at the right time.

"George," Katie whispered. She had landed beside him and placed her hand on his shoulder.

"George," she repeated when he didn't move. He looked up this time, then nodded, making way for her. She was the team Healer, after all. Fred was in good hands.

She countered the Confundus Charm, then grimaced.

"He looks okay, but I don't know about internal injuries. Let's get him to the Hospital Wing," Katie ordered. Oliver nodded, raising his wand, but George held up a hand.

"I'll carry him," George whispered. Oliver held his gaze for a moment, then lowered his wand, nodding.

"I'll put the Bludgers away," Angelina offered.

"I'll get the brooms," Alicia said.

"And I'll sign us out of the Pitch," Oliver added.

George lifted Fred and began the long trek to the Hospital Wing, Katie walking at his side, performing diagnostic charms as they went.

Three hours later, Fred would wake up and not remember a thing.

George would make a joke about the whole thing and they would laugh.

They will never find out who Confunded Fred.

But when George wishes Fred goodnight that evening, and they crawl into their separate beds at half past midnight, George will no longer feel like the half to a whole.

Part of him will be afraid of this.

And part of him will be overjoyed.

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**Author's Note: There's the twins for you! We've got two chapters to go, and I know exactly who they'll focus on! Hurray for having a plan! Please, as always, remember to leave a review.**


	30. Possession

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but my own imagination. The characters depicted here all belong to J.K. Rowling except for those that I have fabricated for the story's purpose. The song lyric belongs to Kelly Clarkson and company.**

**Author's Note: ****Welcome back. Please read, and please review this chapter. We're almost done. I take a liberty with canon - it's not something that does happen, but we're never told that it doesn't either. See if you can spot it.**

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_Because of you_

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He walks the corridors of his first home in silence. It costs too much effort at this point to overcome his host. Instead, he watches from within the recesses of his host's mind, waiting. Watching with stolen eyes.

Feeling with a stolen heart.

His host's hand reaches out to caress the cold stone of Hogwarts Castle. He wasn't going to war with his host today - he needed to save his energy in case there was a conflict tomorrow - but he couldn't resist. He had to feel the castle's call underneath his fingertips once again.

He couldn't resist all of that power.

His host closed his eyes to allow him to focus. Focus on that power, that thrust and retraction and thrust and retraction and _thrust!_

His host staggered backward, gasping. The fool couldn't take it. Wasn't strong enough.

But he was. And one day the power would be his. All his.

It would have been his eleven and a half years ago, had it not been for his unfortunate oversight regarding Lily Potter. He was familiar with the old magic, knew it as well as he knew his own name. But he thought that the baby was Severus'. He had told him as much; and if the baby was his, Lily Potter's sacrifice would have been meaningless. In order for the old magic to be called upon, the invoker had to harbor no regrets about the one she wished to protect. It had to be pure love, pure hope, pure power. How could Lily Potter have pure power if the act itself had impure intent, if she was too ashamed to tell her husband that their child was only hers?

Apparently, Severus' source had been mistaken. When he arose, he would have to tell Severus to bring that informant to him for torture. Eleven and a half years' worth seemed fair.

He was getting ahead of himself. It was time to focus on the present, and the present involved his host getting to his office. The host had a class to teach, if one could call his inept, bumbling mutterings teaching.

If only Albus would have let him teach...

Granted, he wanted to do more than merely teach. He wanted to have the influence of Horace Slughorn, his connections to the most powerful wizards and witches of the world. He wanted to misinform and misdirect at his leisure, all from within the confines of his first and only home.

And he wanted to teach.

Only the ones whom he deemed worthy, of course. Only the most powerful.

But to see the thirst for knowledge within their eyes, to see the same need he felt, to train faithful acolytes in the old ways and maybe learn something new?

It would have been rapture.

But Albus ruined that.

No, Lily Potter ruined that. Had she not delayed his plans, he could have taken Hogwarts. He had been so close.

No, that was incorrect. Albus and the Potter girl interfered, but the boy was to blame. Had the boy not been who he was, Lily Potter's sacrifice would have been rendered invalid by the old magics. Had the boy not been so special, Albus would not be protecting him now.

The boy was the only wizard he knew of that could survive the lethal curse. He wanted so desperately to study it, to delve into the only subject to the old magic that remained in the world. He wanted to find where the old magic concentrated itself. Would it be in the heart? No, too obvious. The brain? If so, where?

He wanted to find the power. He needed the power. It was there, within his reach every day, and yet so far, far away.

But he would have it. Just a little bit longer, a little more patience, and it would be his. The Stone, the boy, the Castle.

The _power_.

Lord Voldemort would rise again.

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**Author's Note: Please review; there's one more chapter to go.**


	31. The Power of Love

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but my own imagination. The characters depicted here all belong to J.K. Rowling except for those that I have fabricated for the story's purpose. The song lyric belongs to Kelly Clarkson and company.**

**Author's Note: Welcome back. This chapter is the only chapter with true synergy; it and the previous chapter should be read as companion pieces. I take another liberty with canon here, but I think it's not too much of a stretch for it to have happened. See if you can spot it! Please enjoy, and please review!**

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_Because of you_

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He walks the corridors of his first home in silence. He has lived in many places, survived in many others, but none of them have the warmth of this place. All of them have the memories. Some of them even have the talking portraits. But none of them - none of them - have its warmth.

He reaches out to caress the warm stone of Hogwarts Castle. He wasn't going to say good-bye to this place, he'd promised himself that much - but he just couldn't resist. He had to feel the castle's call underneath his fingertips once again.

He couldn't resist all of that warmth.

It was more than a river overflowing its banks. It was more than a waterfall cascading endlessly into eternity. It was more than a flame that never died, more than the earth beneath one's feet, more than the unyielding pull of a magnet.

It was freshly baked rolls and treacle tart at the Burrow. It was Ginny's smile. It was the gurgle of his baby boy, his mother's eyes in the mirror, the thrusting of a swordpoint into a locket.

It was so warm. And one day he hoped his children would come here to feel what he felt every time he was in this place. It would be theirs - and everyone's.

Eleven years ago, he hardly would have thought this kind of warmth was even possible. He knew then that deep down, families always love each other. So for a while he clung to washed-out grey shirts and wire hangers shaped into crude metal ducks for dear life, counting them as tokens of affection. They had put him in the cupboard so that he would always be close, never out of the way in one of the upstairs bedrooms. They wanted him near because they loved him. He knew it as well as he knew his own name.

But as the years grew longer and the insults grew tarter, his faith began to wane. Like a dammed river, like a fire without fuel, he began to question the possessions he prized so dearly. Like the drought-stricken earth, he grasped for meaning in them but could no longer find it. Like two magnets pushing each other away, he threw them all in the rubbish.

Only an event of gigantic proportions could right his ship, and when it did he couldn't help but feel oddly warm. In the shack talking with Hagrid, on the ride back to shore, on the Underground and even in the damp tunnels of Gringotts he felt like he had all of those years ago when he caressed the bruises as one would a lover's face.

He was getting lost in the past. It was time to focus on the present, and the present involved getting to an office he thought - hoped, somewhat - that he'd never have to see again.

It was bad enough going to visit the Headmaster's office when Dumbledore was there. He was nice, but he was still the Headmaster, and that made him damn scary. Plus, his track record with authority figures wasn't too good. His primary school teachers, in general, were too overworked and bureaucratized to care much for the quiet boy who never caused any trouble. The ones that did were unable to penetrate his gloom in their early attempts and gave up, focusing on the more raucous of their charges.

It had been Dumbledore who had put him there. It had been Dumbledore who had resigned him to years of malnutrition, abuse, and hopelessness. It had been Dumbledore who had made that choice. He could have lived with the Weasleys; Molly often pleaded with Dumbledore to let him stay there, especially after learning what happened to him there. He could have lived with any family, even a Muggle family - hell, even an orphanage would have been better!

But Dumbledore had reasons for damning ten years of his life for the greater good, and he accepted that. It was not Dumbledore's fault. It was not the Dursleys' fault, nor the Weasleys', nor anyone else's save one: Tom Riddle.

Tom Riddle, who years ago came to Hogwarts requesting the same thing he was now. Tom Riddle, a man he could have been had Dumbledore given in to his heart and sent him to the Weasleys, or random Muggles, or even an orphanage. Tom Riddle, the enemy he thwarted and feared for most of his time here at Hogwarts.

It was because of him that most of the events of his life had taken place. It was because of Tom Riddle that he earned his scar, and thus the admiration of a young boy named Ron Weasley. It was because of Tom Riddle that he could (for a time) talk to snakes and save the girl he would come to love. It was because of Tom Riddle that he had gained all of his experience with Defense Against the Dark Arts. It was because of Tom Riddle that he felt like this job could be his.

When he visited Neville's Greenhouses earlier, Neville had informed him that the Headmaster's office was open during the summer. What use were passwords when no students were passing through?

This is where he stands now, at the entrance to the Headmaster's office, waiting to gather the nerve to visit yet another wizard's interpretation of the room. He had liked McGonagall's, and had hoped that when he was ready to take on the position that she would be here. But she had retired two years ago.

He will find his Gryffindor courage and use it to enter. He will greet the Headmaster with respect and ask for the job. And when he leaves the office, he will be smiling. He will be the new Auxiliary Professor of Defense Against the Dark Arts, who will teach a full day of classes a few days a month whenever the regular professor needs a break. Whenever he teaches the lesson on Patroni, more than half of the class will manage at least mist on the first day.

Harry will teach with respect. Harry will teach with intelligence. Harry will teach with love.

And it will be rapture.

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**Author's Note: And there it is, the final chapter. A little over nine months, but it was a fun experiment. Thanks for following me to its conclusion. Please review, and thanks again.**


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